


recognize you anywhere

by friarlucas (authorisasauthordoes)



Series: recognize you anywhere [1]
Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: A lot of alternate universes, Alternate Universe, F/M, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2018-11-13 15:17:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 29,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11187825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/authorisasauthordoes/pseuds/friarlucas
Summary: “Whatever other universes there are, whatever versions of me are running around, whatever they’re out there doing, I’m sure they’re going to find you. One way or another.”She rests her chin on his shoulder, gazing up at him. “How do you know?”“Because, it’s like I said.” He tilts his head to look at her, biting his lip before breaking into another effortless smile. “I’d recognize you anywhere.”





	1. prologue ( new york, present day )

“Do you believe in soulmates?”

The question escapes Riley’s lips before she can really think it over. It hangs in the air, filling the silence of her bedroom.

Lucas makes a face as he contemplates the answer, shrugging. “I don’t know. Why do you ask?”

“You know me,” she says sheepishly, dropping her gaze down to her notebook rather than looking him in the eyes. She doesn’t know why she’s embarrassed, but something about the question seems so silly she wishes she could take it back. His lack of a decisive response doesn’t help matters. “Sometimes I just say things. Ramble, and stuff.”

“Yeah,” he agrees. She glances up long enough to catch his fond smile.

“I guess I was just thinking… do you remember last year when we talked about chaos theory?”

“Barely, but I think so. Farkle was talking about how decisions impact the universe or something?”

Riley nods, twirling a piece of hair in her fingers nervously. “To be honest, I don’t remember like, anything about it, but I was just thinking about this idea of other universes. Universes that are basically our own and yet something is fundamentally different.”

“Right.”

“And then I was thinking, what about universes that are super different from our own? Like, are there versions of us out there who exist in entirely different decades? Entirely different worlds?”

She’s surprised to see him smiling at her when she lifts her eyes again. She’s so used to seeing the exasperation in her friends’ expressions when she gets off on a tangent, but Lucas has never been that way. He’s never seen her tendency to ramble as anything but endearing.

But then again, Lucas has always been a little bit different. A little bit more than a friend.

“What about you?” he asks, propping his hands on his knee and twiddling his thumbs. “Do you believe in soulmates?”

She’s not sure how to answer. In some ways, it feels too convoluted to say yes. Too dramatic, too unrealistic, far too cliché and wistful. It’s exactly the kind of thing people would expect her to believe and exactly the kind of thing people would laugh at her for.

And yet, sitting there, she has to admit to herself that even if she’s not sure they exist, part of her really, really hopes they do. Because there’s nothing more comforting to her than being here with Lucas, sharing this space and their conversation and their existence. She hopes that there’s a version of him with those twinkling green eyes in all potential worlds, humoring her questions and smiling at her ramblings and making her feel whole. She wishes that no matter universe, no matter what reality, she has him.

But that all feels like too much to say aloud. So she doesn’t.

Riley mirrors his shrug, scooting forward and leaning back against the seat of the bay window next to him. She bumps her shoulder against his, tilting her head back and forth. “I don’t know. I mean, I love the idea of it, you know? This possibility that there’s someone out there who is always meant to be in your life, regardless of circumstance. That’s a nice concept.”

Lucas nods along to her explanation, absentmindedly dropping one of his hands to link his fingers with hers. She smiles in spite of herself, relaxing and leaning into him. “Well, I can say at least one thing for sure.”

“What?”

Lucas brushes his thumb against her knuckles, hesitating as he collects his thoughts. “Whatever other universes there are, whatever versions of me are running around, whatever they’re out there doing, I’m sure they’re going to find you. One way or another.”

She rests her chin on his shoulder, gazing up at him. “How do you know?”

“Because, it’s like I said.” He tilts his head to look at her, biting his lip before breaking into another effortless smile. “I’d recognize you anywhere.”


	2. desolation ( ruins of america, distant future )

Ash. Lucas is so sick of ash.

It’s an unfortunate thing to be sick of considering there’s so much of it. It’s so commonplace at this point it’s barely even note-worthy—he only comments on it _because_ he’s so sick of it. There’s a layer of ash on everything, from the grass to the rubble to the surface of the water. It’s in the air, blown around now and again with the wind.

It’s in his hair, dulling it to silver from its usual blonde. It’s on his skin, speckling him with grey and impossible to scrub off completely. It’s in his lungs, making it impossible to breathe. He wonders what it must feel like to be able to breathe properly. To be born and live and die without ever struggling to take a breath.

A century and half since the nuclear fall-out, and there’s still so much ash.

Still, Lucas appreciates how the sun shines on regardless. Everything is dull and grey, sure, but the sun still rises and brightens the world around him. It’s hard to see through the haze, but it’s enough. Enough to progress and keep moving forward. Enough to get through each day no matter how hard it is to breathe.

Enough to survive.

Reclined back against the half-crumbling wall at the edge of the city behind him, he makes a small tick mark with his pen on the inside of his arm. Just another small dash in the sea of dozens slowly crawling up his arm. He’s not exactly certain what he’s measuring or why he does it every single day—maybe for some semblance of order. Maybe to keep track of something other than how hungry he’s going to be that night. Maybe as some sort of twisted reminder that he’s alive, still alive, has been alive since he finally left the bunker and took off on his own.

The bunker hadn’t been the most restful place to stay, but it had food. It had clean water. It had his family and some friends, although he’s not exactly sure he would refer to Maya as a friend. Their families didn’t interact much other than to discuss rations, but for a while there she was the only person he had left. When he thinks about it, he can’t quite believe he stayed so long after she passed away too.

Another tick mark. Another day. Another cough.

Lucas really hates ash.

He squints up at the sun, soaking up as much of it as he can. He knows there was supposedly something dangerous about sitting in the sun all day back before the bombs, but at this point it’s what’s keeping him alive so he’s going to absorb all the light he can get. He has no idea what his skin is supposed to look like, but he’s pretty sure it’s not supposed to be this pale.

Climbing to his feet, he slings his bag over his shoulder and tries to fight off the inherent dizziness from getting up so fast. He knows he’s hungry—his body doesn’t have to remind him all the time.

He whistles. “Judy!”

Barking erupts from somewhere around the corner before Judy appears in front of him, a large golden retriever bounding across the grimy landscape. Like Lucas, her coat is dusted with ash, making her appear more grey than gold.

Also like Lucas, aside from him, she’s entirely alone.

She trots up to his side, circling his legs before plopping into a sitting position. Waiting loyally for him to lead the way, as she usually does.

He turns around, staring up at the ruins of the metropolis looming behind him. Empty, hollow, falling apart brick by brick. He can’t imagine how it was once filled with thousands of people. Maybe tens of thousands. Hundreds, even, if it was one of those major cities.

He salutes it dryly, the ashen ground crunching beneath his boots as he starts in the opposite direction. Judy prances along beside him, leaving the ghost of the city behind.

Lucas doesn’t have a set destination or path. It would be hard to, considering he has no idea where he is or where he stands relative to the rest of the barren world around him. So he just moves forward, moving for the sake of moving, and hopes he’ll end up where he’s supposed to be.

For now, what he’s moving towards is whatever water he can get. Food, he can get by without, at least for a little while. Water is less negotiable.

Having been alone for a couple years now, he’s become pretty good at tracking it. The closer he gets to a source of water, the darker the ground around him gets. Sometimes, there are trails along the grass through the grime where water trickled through, and that usually points him in the right direction. If the ash is good for anything, it’s navigation, so he guesses he shouldn’t complain.

He’s used to searching for nothing. He’s used to struggling to get through the day. He’s expecting the water to be a hard find, and likely unusable when he arrives at the source.

What he’s not expecting at all is to not be the only one kneeling at the riverbed.

Judy spots her first, launching into yips and taking off towards the water’s edge. Lucas calls after her in confusion, willing his legs to have enough energy to run and catch up. “Judy! Judy, back off!”

The stranger jumps as the dog approaches, losing her balance and collapsing from her precarious crouching position. It’s obvious she’s more than terrified of the sneak attack.

Lucas whistles loudly enough to regain Judy’s attention. The dog looks back and forth between them, torn between usual companion and curious newcomer before loyalty wins out and she pads back over to him. She does her traditional circle around his legs before resting into a sitting position behind him, watching the girl curiously with a raised ear.

The girl manages to get herself back upright, her shoulders heaving with a sigh. He can’t tell if her hair is naturally dark or if the ash is making it duller than normal. It’s cut short and jagged, like she just hacked it off as best she could with whatever she had on hand. She glances behind her to trail after the creature who attacked her, her gaze drifting until she locks eyes with Lucas.

He has no idea what to say or do. He’s admittedly having a difficult time processing the fact that she’s there. He wonders if maybe he’s hallucinating her. It’s been months, years since he last saw another human being. There just aren’t that many left.

And if he were to see one again, he doesn’t see how it could be someone as pretty as her.

She breaks the freeze first, smiling lightly before averting her gaze and focusing back on the water. It’s then that he figures he should force his feet to move before he dies of thirst.

He’s disappointed but not surprised to see the layer of grime floating along the surface of the river, marking it as undrinkable. He’s seen it enough times to be unfazed. But he’s surprised to see the girl collecting it anyway, seemingly indifferent to the gritty quality.

“Hey, hey,” he says urgently, dropping down to his knees next to her and holding out a hand warningly. “You shouldn’t drink that.”

“Why not?” Her eyes are wide. “It is contaminated?”

He blinks. He’s not sure if her question is serious or not. “Have you looked at it?”

She glances down at the canister in her hands, shrugging mildly. “Well, most water looks this way. Once I purify it, it turns out alright.”

“Purify it?”

She nods, smiling slightly at the puzzlement in his tone. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a small bottle, uncapping it and dabbing a few drops of mysterious liquid into the water. He watches as she closes the canister and shakes it around a bit, before laying it on the ground at her feet. “It takes a couple of minutes.”

“What is that?” he asks, pointing to the bottle at her side. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

“I don’t know what it is, exactly. My parents gave it to me before—,” She cuts herself off, chewing her lip and gazing at the riverbed instead. “I’ve had for a long time. And it does what it’s supposed to do, so I think that’s good.”

“Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it.”

She grins at his disbelief, eyes lingering on his face before she tears her gaze away to look over her shoulder. Judy paces the dirt behind them, sniffing along the ash and sneezing accordingly. “Your companion, then?”

“Yeah. Her name is Judy. Sorry she scared you.”

“It’s okay. I’m just glad she turned out to be friendly.”

“Yeah,” Lucas agrees, keeping an eye on the hound as she wanders her way over to the bushes. “She’s harmless. She can hunt though.” He pauses, amending his statement. “Well, when there’s things _to_ hunt. Which isn’t all that often.”

“Still food, though.”

He nods in agreement. “Food is food.”

When Lucas turns his head back to face her, he’s startled to catch her staring at him. Maybe it’s because it’s been so long since another human being has been in his presence, let alone made eye contact with him. Or maybe it’s because her eyes are so big and so brown and so full of life he feels like the entire galaxy must be trapped inside them.

In a dead world greying and covered in ash, he’s never seen something so alive.

“Forgive me for staring,” she says breathlessly, not making any point to stop examining him. “It’s just… it’s been a really long time since I’ve seen another person. One still breathing, at least. A human being rather than a corpse.”

Lucas isn’t sure he counts as either. Some days he’s more dust than humanity. “It’s okay. I get it.”

There’s another brief moment of silence, the two of them soaking each other up with the likelihood being it’ll be a while before they see another person again. To Lucas, it feels a little bit like soaking up the sun—dangerous, vulnerable, but absolutely essential. In some ways, he feels like maybe if he looks at her long enough, he’ll be able to breathe again.

“It’s probably ready,” she says quietly, dropping her gaze down to the canister and prying it open. She inspects it quickly before breaking into a smile, tilting it in his direction for him to see.

It’s not the most appealing water he’s ever seen before—nothing could beat that bottled water from the bunker that was nearly perfect and pure of ash—but it looks miles better than anything he’s seen for ages. He licks his lips instinctively, suddenly realizing how dry his mouth is. How chapped his lips are. How for all the good that sunlight is doing him, it’s drying him up from the inside out.

Her mouth curls into a gentle smile, holding out the canister for him. “Drink.”

He wants to be polite and decline, as the water is hers to drink. But his drive to survive overrides any sort of civility, and he takes the canister without hesitation.

There’s something about clean water that is hard to fully appreciate until it’s been too long without it. Lucas knows he must seem rabid, downing the water so greedily, but his dining etiquette is lost somewhere with his politeness and energy. He drinks as much as he stomach without worrying he’ll just cough it back up, finally forcing himself to stop before he drains the whole canister.

She’s beaming at him, courtesy glimmering in her brown eyes. “Here, put it on the ground. Let Judy have some.”

He almost refuses, but he knows in his heart that the girl is right. He can’t be selfish, especially towards the loyal companion he’s had all this time. He whistles again, Judy bounding over and fixating on the water once she’s close enough to notice it.

She watches as Judy laps it up desperately, lifting her gaze to lock eyes with Lucas again. “So, she’s Judy. I’m Riley. What do you call yourself?”

Riley. It’s strange, hearing a name he’s never heard before and realizing it belongs to someone real and concrete and alive. “I’m Lucas.”

“Lucas,” she repeats slowly, the smile still present on her face. Her features soften a bit. “I love it. Although, I guess I’d love any name I heard that wasn’t my own at this point.”

He laughs—he can’t remember the last time he laughed. “Yeah, guess so.”

Riley waits until Judy has satisfied her thirst enough, pulling the canister from her and setting into refilling it again. “You know, you’ve got the food. I’ve got the water.” She peeks up at him. “Sounds like we’d make a pretty good team.”

Judy settles into a sitting position, looking more relaxed than she has in months. Lucas is feeling a similar sense of ease. “Maybe. Yeah.”

The two of them make small talk as they wait for the next round of water to purify, stiff and awkward but both relieved to be interacting with another soul again. It’s easy to remember how hungry you are, how thirsty you are, how tired you are—it’s easy to forget how lonely you are.

Once they’ve risen to their feet, Riley gazes out at the wasteland before them. Nothing but miles and miles of ash. “So? What do you say?”

“About what?”

She laughs, rocking on her feet slightly. “Teaming up. Sticking together. At least for a little while. If it gets weird, or whatever, then no harm, no foul.”

Lucas blinks at her, clearing his throat anxiously. “Yeah, uh, I guess we should.”

“If I understand it correctly, ‘I guess’ is more of a reluctant phrase than an actual indication of desire,” Riley states, tilting her head at him. “Want to try again?”

He decides he rather likes the smirk on her face. And he likes that it belongs to her rather than anybody else. In a weird, inexplicable way, it feels a little familiar.

“Yes.” He says more confidently, nodding to emphasize the point. “I would like to, very much.”

Her smirk widens into a grin. She leads the way forward, Lucas whistling for Judy to tag along behind them. In the sky above, the clouds of ash part just enough to let in the sunshine. Not a whole lot, but enough.

Just enough to survive.


	3. artistry ( alt. new york, 1980s )

There’s something about the rain that makes Riley question why she ever decided she wanted to be a poet.

Well, in her heart of hearts she knows why. Because there’s nothing that makes her feel more at ease than trapping all her thoughts in a stanza, some magical kind of catharsis happening when her pen hits the notebook. Because words have made her laugh, made her cry, made her lie awake at night turning them over in her mind, and she wants to be able to give other people that same experience. Because nothing else would really make her happy, and she’s spent so much of her life chasing happiness.

She still feels those things—she feels it in her bones. But the prospect of writing for a living seemed much shinier in college, when life was still simple and her parents still assisted her and the world looked out for her.

Her father always told her the world would look out for her. That when she met the world and made it her own, it would care about her.

The notebook full of poems, yet bank account emptied to pay rent, big to differ.

Still, she knows things could be worse. She has a roof over her head, relatively cozy for the city these days. She has two wonderful roommates to scrape the rent together with. Maya is fierce and vivacious and keeps her out of her own head, an artist just like her only with paints and charcoals rather than words. Isadora is the level head to ground their dreamy duo, much more concerned with science and engineering and currently holding down a steady position at the nearest technical firm. Despite her struggle, her parents still support her creative endeavors—even if they’re somewhat certain she’s destined to fail.

All this, and she gets to pursue what she loves. All things considered, she should consider herself lucky.

But on those days when the pages stay blank and the words won’t translate from her brain to the paper, she has trouble remembering all that. It’s much easier to wallow in it and question every decision she’s ever made.

The rain isn’t really to blame, but it doesn’t exactly discourage her mood.

The standard funk settles over her as she stares out the window from her usual table in her favorite café, _Svorski’s,_ watching her fellow New Yorkers charge through the storm. People-watching has always been one of her favorite hobbies—especially when the words won’t come—and her spot in the bakery is the perfect place to do so.

Riley has to admire the tenacity of New York’s residents. The rain hardly seems to be a deterrent for most of them, marching through the downpour in their coats or umbrellas without a second thought. Cars bumble along in traffic as if nothing is any different, rainwater sloshing onto the sidewalk as tires roll through puddles along the curb. They’ve all got places to be, it seems, and nothing is going to stop them come hell or high water.

She wishes she shared that tenacity when writer’s block hits as hard as it is today. Instead she sulks, tracking rain drops as they make their way leisurely down the glass in front of her.

Riley perks up slightly when one of those drenched residents comes barreling into the café, taking care to wipe their boots on the mat before pulling off their hood and wiping the moisture from their eyes. There’s a lot about the stranger that grabs her attention—the sharp jawline, the way he licks his lips as he surveys the place, the dirty blonde hair all windswept from the weather and the hood—but nothing strikes her more than his hands.

It’s not because they’re nice-looking (although they are), but because they’re covered in dirt. Or at least she thinks it’s dirt. It’s completely taken over his hands, dulling them to grey and contrasting sharply with the golden tan present on the rest of his skin.

Riley watches him wander up to the counter and order, fixated on him and his ashen hands rather than the raindrops. She props her chin on her hands and lets her mind wander, trying to figure out what exactly causes his hands to look that way. It’s far more interesting than staring at the droplets on the window, in any case.

Before she reaches a conclusion, he’s heading back out the door into the downpour with a fresh cup of coffee in hand. As he’s pushing out the door, his eyes glance over towards her table and lock with hers for the briefest of moments.

He offers her a polite smile. Then he’s gone, washed away with the rain.

The moment was so quick, but the eye contact leaves her fingertips tingling and her heart is beating a little bit faster than it was a second ago. She can’t even remember what color his eyes are considering how swiftly they looked away, but she thinks they’re green. For whatever reason, her memory is seared with the softness of them.

Suddenly inspired, Riley flips her notebook open and pulls the pen out from her haphazard bun, dabbing the tip of it on her tongue for flair before jotting down the lightning strike that hit her when those green eyes met hers.

_A glance only lasts a second,_

_but the green is eternal,_

_Vast enough to get lost in,_

_And you want to know it._

She chews on the end of her pen, staring out the window again. It’s not great, but it’s a start, and that’s more than she had a minute ago.

Outside the café, the rain slows to a shower as the clouds part, allowing sunshine to cut through the towering city skyline and light up the streets. Riley can’t help but smile, thinking about how she feels the same way. Fighting through writer’s block feels that way, pushing aside the clouds and letting in the sun.

She wonders if she’ll ever see her sun again, or if he’ll be lost to the streets of New York forever.

 

* * *

 

Riley quickly learns that the sun does indeed rise each morning, and her sun shows up again the very next day. And the next day. And the day after that. Before long, grey hands is just as much a regular as she is at _Svorski’s_.

It’s very much a routine. He shows up about the same time every day, orders presumably the same coffee as the day before, and disappears as quickly as he came. His hands are always monochromatic, covered in mystery. As Riley is always at her usual table, their eyes always meet and he always offers the same timid smile before he pushes out the door and back into the void.

Although she neglects to bring it up with her roommates when they have their daily dish over dinner at the apartment, she spends an inordinate amount of time thinking about him. Daydreaming about the green. Musing over that shy, slightly lopsided smile. Thinking about the hands, always wondering about the hands.

Her notebook is now full of little verses about him, snippets of rhymes about grey and green and gold. Poems she may never finish, but that have kept her creativity flourishing since that rainy afternoon. She usually shows her work to Maya and Isadora—for an artistic and analytical view point, respectively—but these she keeps to herself. They feel too personal to share, even though nothing about them indicates such an intimacy.

This pattern continues for days, weeks even, before Riley decides to do something about it.

It’s a sunny, humid day, and she’s very preoccupied with worrying over how badly her hair is going to frizz by the time she leaves the café that evening when he enters through the door right on time. Jawline still sharp, eyes still soft green, hands still intriguingly grey.

Her eyes follow him to the counter as they always do before drifting down to her notebook, pen still poised between her fingers. She had been flipping through it when he walked in, and the page open in front of her almost feels like a sign from the universe.

_And you want to know it._

_You want to know it._

_You want to know it._

So when he makes his way back towards the entrance, coffee in hand, Riley decides to make a bold move. The world was built on women with bold moves, that’s what her mother always taught her. She figures if her father was wrong about the world, maybe at least her mother will be right about this.

Before he can offer his polite smile and disappear into the city streets once more, she clears her throat and wills herself to speak. “What’s your poison?”

He stops halfway towards reaching for the door, hesitating before turning his gaze on her. This time, it lasts longer than a brief smile.

But the evident confusion on his face doesn’t exactly make it feel like a victory. “Huh?”

For supposedly being great with words, for wanting to make a whole career out of it, Riley cannot believe how stupid she is with them sometimes. _What’s your poison?_ Is she the swarthy heroine of a bad pirate novel? She resists the urge to slam her head into the table until she blacks out.

Then she realizes he’s still staring at her, waiting for an explanation.

“I just meant, your coffee,” she stammers, trying very hard to explain herself as concisely as possible. At this point, she figures the less words the better. “You come in here every day, order the same thing. I have to believe it must be good or I don’t think you’d keep coming back.”

Her mother was wrong, too. They were all wrong. Parents are liars and the world is out to get her and she’s destined to fail and spend the rest of her life wasting away in the sewers of New York City. She wonders if she’ll even live to see the new millennium.

Although she feels like shriveling up and disappearing, the light smile that crosses his lips alleviates some of the stress. He appears less scared than she thinks he should be, more amused than anything else. “You really want to know my coffee order?”

“Well, like I said,” she says loftily, linking her fingers together on the tabletop and praying that she comes across as aloof. “It must be pretty amazing if you’re returning each day. Maybe I’m not ordering the right thing. Maybe I’m missing out on something spectacular.”

“You’re here every day, too,” he defends himself, smile disappearing momentarily when someone lightly bumps him from behind to get through. He glances over his shoulder, suddenly remembering he’s standing in front of the doorway.

Bold moves.

“Would you like to sit down?” she offers, gesturing to the eternally empty seat across from her.

He contemplates for a long moment before breaking into another lopsided smile, nodding eagerly and pulling the seat out to join her.

She learns that his name is Lucas, and she thinks it’s just about the nicest name she’s ever heard. He’s surprisingly easy to talk to, and they spend an inordinate amount of time gabbing at each other that afternoon for complete strangers. The sun is starting to set by the time they finally agree to get going, standing outside the café for another five minutes before they manage to split up and go their separate ways.

Riley finally tells Maya and Isadora about him, but only because she can’t wipe the smile off her face when she walks through the door. It’s such a dead giveaway.

It isn’t until she’s lying in bed that night, drifting into sleep, that she realizes she forgot to ask about the grey. So much more to get caught up in, she supposes.

 

* * *

 

As it turns out, asking about the hands that caught her attention in the first place isn’t the only thing she forgot the previous evening. When Lucas shows up at the café the next day, her notebook in hand, she practically buries him in gratitude and has to seriously resist the urge to hug him.

“It’s okay,” he assures her as he settles in across from her, sliding it across the table towards her. He grins as she scrapes it up and cradles it against her chest, exhaling a huge sigh of relief. “I only found it because I forgot something too.”

He tugs lightly on the sleeve of his jean jacket, slung casually over the back of his chair. Riley smiles fondly at him, resting the book back on the table.

“I didn’t read it, by the way.” He raises a hand in surrender, getting to his feet when the barista calls his name. “Just wanted to put that out there.”

Riley appreciates the respect of her privacy, but there’s a small part of her that wishes he had flipped through it. She has no idea why, doesn’t have any clue what difference it would make, yet she wants him to have access to the most intimate parts of herself.

Maybe not the poems about him. That might come off a little strong.

When he returns he’s carrying two coffees instead of one, gently placing the second in front of her. She gives him an intrigued look, tilting her head.

“You said you wanted to know my coffee order,” he says cheekily, nodding to the cup and smirking. “There you go.”

“Oh, ha ha.” She swallows sheepishly, reaching forward to take a sip of it anyway. It’s less bitter than she expects it to be—a mistaken judgment based on his brawny build, she admits to herself—and there’s a lingering taste of vanilla that’s rather pleasant.

She understands why he keeps coming back, anyway.

“That wasn’t actually what I wanted to know,” she admits after a couple of moments of silence. She thumbs the lid of her cup, eyeing him over the brim. “When I stopped you yesterday.”

“I figured as much,” he says, matching her tone. He reclines more comfortably in his chair, taking a sip of his own coffee. “Well, what were you actually going to ask? Feel free to question me on anything.”

“Anything?”

“Anything,” he confirms.

“What’s the capitol of Idaho?”

He laughs, prompting a pleased grin from her. She decides she really likes the sound of his laugh—she’d be lying if she claimed she didn’t immediately start trying to put it into words in her head. But as she’s struggled with for weeks, capturing him on paper is hard to do justice.

“I kid, I kid.” Riley glances down at his hands wrapped around his cup, still covered in a layer of grey. “I just always wondered why your hands were… well, like that.” Lucas raises his eyebrows, glancing down at his hands in confusion. She panics, figuring she’s said absolutely the wrong thing. “Not to say that they’re wrong or anything. They’re perfectly nice. I mean—,”

“Oh,” Lucas says pointedly, laughing in spite of himself and shaking his head slightly. “Why they’re—yeah. I just totally forget that they must look strange to people when I go walking around with them like this.”

Riley nods timidly, smiling as she waits for his explanation.

“It’s clay,” he clarifies. He lets go of the coffee and holds out his hands for her to get a better look, palms facing up.

Now that he’s said it out loud, it feels quite obvious looking at it up close. The material couldn’t be anything else. It’s cracking along his knuckles and palm lines, long since dried out. She also can’t help but notice just how very nice-looking his hands actually are, calloused skin and long fingers and golden tan peeking through the grey.

She swallows, mouth a little drier than it was before. She takes a long drink of her coffee to assuage the issue.

“I just spend so much time with it, I don’t even notice anymore. I’m a sculptor,” he adds as an afterthought, as if that wasn’t somewhat a given.

She’s more than interested. “A sculptor?”

“Well, a wannabe one, anyway,” he says offhandedly, scratching his ear. “You know, constantly creating but not actually getting anywhere. The usual grind for a starving artist in New York, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Hey,” Riley says, holding up her notebook emphatically. “Preaching to the choir.”

“So that’s what’s tucked away in there. What do you write?” He smirks. “What’s your poison?”

“Okay, very funny.” Once he’s stopped chuckling at her expense, she places the notebook back against the tabletop, lining up the edges. “Poetry.”

“You’re a poet?”

“Well, a wannabe one, anyway. Much better at dreaming than actually doing.” She beams at him, crossing her legs and reclining more comfortably to match his posture. “You know, the usual grind for a starving artist in New York.”

He returns the smile, both of them lifting their cups in mock cheer before taking a drink. Despite the cheekiness of their conversation, Riley feels something real in the air between them. For all their wisdom, she wonders if maybe her parents aren’t all wrong. The world sent Lucas coming back for vanilla coffee every day. Her bold move is the reason they’re sitting together at her usual table, finally giving her someone to share it with. All things considered, they found each other.

Despite their lack of success in an unforgiving business, maybe the world cares about them, too.

 

* * *

 

After a few months of the same old routine, Maya and Isadora become exasperated with Riley’s insistence that she and Lucas are just friends.

Isadora insists that someone she meets with every day and talks to for hours on end is significant in some capacity, whether they’re a lover or a well-needed therapist. She helpfully points out that Riley has told this guy more about herself than she’s ever told anyone else, and that the way her eyes widen and her voice becomes a little more breathless when she speaks about him indicates an obvious biological attraction.

Maya insists that someone she has such a strong connection to can’t be just a friend. That if she met someone who understood her artistic eccentricity, if they just showed up out of the blue and locked eyes with her at the coffee shop every day and talked for hours on end, she’d be sure the universe was trying to tell her something.

And if they were as cute as Riley describes him—sculptor Lucas with his soft green eyes and clay-covered hands—she would sure be listening.

Riley is doing a lot of listening of her own, learning more and more about Lucas each time they meet and share another coffee. He’s a contractor by commission to earn enough money to pay the rent, sharing a small apartment with his best friend. His name is Zay, and he’s also an artist, only his passion is dance rather than clay. The reason she’s never seen him before is because he recently moved from Austin, Texas to come to the city, both he and his best friend packing up everything to take their chances in the artistic epicenter of the country. He admits that Zay is having more luck than him, but he’s always been an optimist so he’s not giving up quite yet.

Riley definitely understands having a more talented best friend, gushing about how beautiful Maya’s art is and how she’s already locked down a few showings of her pieces in local art galleries. She’s yet to do anything with her poetry that makes it accessible to the public, but she understands being an optimist too. It surprises her, really, how much she and Lucas are alike.

Over time, they open up more about their art, sharing little bits of it with one another. Riley starts letting him see one poem a day from her journal—never the ones about him, obviously—and he starts bringing in a couple of photographs of his projects.

When she sees the miniature model of a horse, captured mid-trot and mane billowing in the wind, her jaw drops open. She holds the photograph closer and studies it in awe, shaking her head slightly at the detail in the craftsmanship.

“This is incredible,” she exclaims. Lucas waves her off, cheeks flushed. “No, really. I mean, it actually looks like a horse running. The attention to detail is insane. I can’t believe it’s all clay.”

“They don’t all look that impressive,” he assures her. “I’m just good at horses. I was obsessed with them when I was younger. We worked with them a lot in Texas. Sometimes I think I should’ve been a veterinarian. I probably would have more success there than I’m having right now.”

Riley leans back in her chair, still absorbed in the photo. “Does it have a name?”

“Sophia. She’s based off this horse I had back in Austin. When I was in middle school, I’d spend a lot of time in the stables and Sophia was—,” He suddenly stops himself, shaking his head and shrugging. “Anyway, that’s all. Just a horse I had.”

“No, there was more.” Riley raises her eyebrows, placing the photograph on the table and tilting her head at him. “There’s more to the story.”

“Really, it’s boring. You wouldn’t want to hear the whole thing.”

Before she realizes she’s doing it, Riley reaches out and brushes her fingers across the back of his hand. He hesitates, staring down at their hands while she keeps her eyes on him. The dried clay feels chalky under her fingertips, but his hand is pleasantly warm.

She allows her hand to rest fully on top of his, nodding encouragingly. “More.”

 

* * *

  

After a couple more weeks of coffee-fueled conversations and further reinforcement from her maddened roommates, Riley finally works up the courage to invite Lucas to meet outside the tiny universe they built at the window table at _Svorski’s_.

Like every creatively motivated couple in the city, they spend an afternoon at the Met, spending more time talking about one another than the masterpieces on display. She’s much more excited to take the short walk back to his apartment, feeling honored when he allows her to step into the space and get a real look at some of his projects.

“Sorry for the mess,” he says quickly as he closes the door behind them.

Riley rolls her eyes, pushing some hair behind her ear as she steps around the room. “I’ve got a painter for a roommate, remember? This is practically nothing.”

Crossing the apartment and heading over to the open space by the window, Riley steps onto the tarp and takes in the assortment of sculptures, some half-finished and some just beginning to form into something tangible.

She kneels down in front of the miniature Sophia, even more awe-inspiring in person than through a photograph. Lucas walks over to join her as she rises back to her feet, stuffing his hands into his pockets and shrugging. “Not much.”

“You severely undersell yourself. No wonder you’re having trouble getting spotlight,” she teases.

“Hey now,” he scoffs, smiling at her as she lightly elbows him in the ribs. “That’s a low blow.”

Riley turns to face him, and standing amidst the neutral tones of grey and taupe she suddenly realizes what’s off about the visual.

“Your hands!” she blurts out, reaching forward and pulling his hands from his pockets by his wrists. His hands are no longer grey with leftover clay, scrubbed clean to reveal skin as soft and golden as the rest of him.

Lucas tilts his head back and forth, playing it off like it’s nothing. He doesn’t move his hands from hers, allowing her to hold them. “Well, considering we were breaking routine anyway, I figured I could clean up a bit.”

“Well, you clean up very nice,” she jokes, removing one hand from his to smooth out the collar of his jacket. She doesn’t know why she does it, but the gesture happens naturally enough and she decides not to question it.

They’re very aware of the limited space between them considering there’s usually a table stuck in the middle.

Riley tries to remember how she felt that day he first walked into the café. Tries to compare that feeling to the way feels now. His eyes are still enchantingly green, even more so with them so close. Even with his features as soft as they are now, looking at her, his jawline is still impressively sharp and she has to wonder with her silly poetic mind if maybe he was chiseled from marble or shaped from clay. How else could someone so aesthetically lovely exist in the same plane of reality as her?

But then, she knows that’s not true. Because he’s much more beautiful on the inside, and she knows that making art that life-like and enrapturing and real is an impossible task. No matter what the medium.

What she’s really captivated by in that moment are his lips. She’s never been near enough to get a good vantage point of them, but now she’s very, very near. Getting closer every second, the two of them drifting together like some kind of magnetism.

“Whoa, whoa!” an unfamiliar voice shouts as the front door to the apartment opens. Riley jumps, both her and Lucas immediately stepping a couple of inches away from one another. He clears his throat, tossing a look towards the doorway.

“Zay.”

Riley gets a good look at Lucas’s fabled roommate, surprised by how friendly and upbeat he seems. He’s definitely built like a dancer, lithe and sinewy but obviously muscular within that wiry frame. The impish grin on his face makes her want to get to know him, just so she can be in on his jokes and absorb some of that vibrant energy he gives off from simply walking into the room.

“Oh, please, don’t stop on account of me,” he says dramatically, raising his hands in surrender and traipsing around the room. “You go on doing what you’re doing.”

Riley can’t help but giggle, turning towards Lucas and tucking her head against his upper arm. Lucas shakes his head at his best friend. “We’re not doing anything!”

“Of course not.” Zay disappears into the bedroom, before poking his head back out and offering her a smile. “I’m Zay. You are no doubt Riley. I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of each other in the future. As if I don’t hear enough about you.”

“Alright, that’s good, thanks buddy.”

“Kind of amazed I’m not constantly staring at some sculpture version of you stuck in the middle of our apartment, to be honest.”

“Okay, you’re done. Bye, Zay.”

He offers one final salute to Riley, hopping back into the bedroom and out of sight as he shuts the door behind him. Lucas chews on his lip, caught in a perpetual wince from that interaction that cracks Riley up when she catches the expression on his face.

They grab dinner somewhere quick and Lucas insists on paying even though she can’t count on her fingers the amount of coffees he’s inadvertently bought her already, and they never said anything about this being a date so she’s not sure she has any right to be accepting such courtesy from him. He also insists on walking her home despite how long she’s lived in this city, the two of them keeping up their usual light conversation until they ascend the steps to her building.

“Well, thank you for walking me home,” she says softly.

He nods. Her writer mind is running again, trying to comprehend how his eyes can look even more stunning in the dull glow of the street lamps. Little flecks of gold amidst the vast green.

Vast enough to get lost in. Now she knows it.

Now she wants it.

Her hands find one of his, turning it over in her fingers to look at the clean palm. She gently runs a finger over the lines etched into his skin. “Wonder if I’ll ever see these hands this clean again.”

“Tomorrow, probably,” he admits. “Have this construction job so I probably won’t be able to get much work done.”

“You’ll still be at the café?” She knows she shouldn’t care, but she’s hoping to God he’ll respond in an affirmation. They broke tradition today, but she doesn’t want to end the routine entirely.

He smiles, using his free hand to lightly brush some hair behind her ear. She feels her heart pound a little harder against her ribcage. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

His touch lingers in her hair before gently tracing down to her cheek. She finds herself leaning into his hand, welcoming the caress.

“You know, it wasn’t the coffee that kept me coming back.”

“What?”

He swallows, keeping his eyes on the spot where he’s stroking her cheek so he can avoid looking her in the eyes. He squints slightly, pressing his lips together before speaking again. “I wasn’t coming in every day for the coffee. I mean, I was at first, but after the first week or so I don’t think that was why I kept coming around.”

She tilts her head. “Why would you, then?”

“You, I think. Think I wanted to see if you’d still be there. And you were. Always smiling.” He shrugs, eventually lifting his gaze to lock eyes with her. “Kept coming back for you.”

Riley wants to capture this feeling in her chest. She wants to put it on paper and publish it for the entire world to see and experience. If she could make the entire world feel as simultaneously full and weightless as she does right now, she figures it would be a better place.

And that’s before the kiss. When she takes the front of his jacket in her fingers and pulls him into a kiss, she knows that’s a feeling she’ll never be able to replicate. It’s an experience shared between the two of them, meant for the two of them alone.

It’s the most beautiful art she’s ever known. And she’s more than happy to keep it between the two of them. A collaboration piece, a masterpiece only possible with her and him and whatever it is they have swirling in the air between them.

She writes a lot of poems that night. Maya and Isadora don’t bother trying to read them—they can get all the information they need from the ever-present grin on her face.

 

* * *

 

Despite his assurance otherwise, Lucas doesn’t show up at the usual time for coffee. He doesn’t show up at all. Riley convinces herself there’s a logical explanation—construction ran late. Something came up. She walks away from the lonely afternoon very understanding and rather optimistic.

But then he doesn’t show up the next day. And the next day. And the day after that.

As quickly as he entered her world it seems he’s disappeared, gone with the change in season as if he had never been there.

Riley wonders if maybe something terrible has happened, but she realizes she doesn’t have any way to contact him. She never thought to get his number, taking advantage of the fact that he was such a constant. She never considered the possibility that he may not be there one day.

The table at _Svorski’s_ is suddenly suffocating. It’s not right with the empty chair across from her.

When his absence has gone on long enough, Riley actually takes the time to walk to his place and check in on him, but every time she comes by nobody is home. She even checks with the attendant to ask if the apartment is for rent, but he assures her that it’s still occupied and no one has moved out recently.

He’s not gone, he didn’t leave. He’s just gone from her life, and her life alone.

She writes more poetry, and lots of it. It’s a surprisingly good motivator, loneliness, and it pushes her to start getting more serious about her collections. Put a portfolio together, start searching for an agent. She’s not going to be another starving writer that fades into the concrete of the New York streets.

She’s not going to simply disappear.

 

* * *

 

It’s a few long, laborious months before she sees him again.

For all her hard work, she’s finally starting to see results. Maya and Isadora had assisted her in finding the perfect agent to start with, and she’s currently in the process of selecting which of her pieces she wants published in a local New York writer’s magazine. It’s not a huge publication, but it’s notorious for giving writers and poets their start, and she’s taking the honor very seriously.

It’s why she finds herself back at _Svorski’s_ that afternoon, sorting through copies of her poems and trying to narrow down the best of the best. She’s mostly focused on her new stuff, but her gaze hovers over one of the photocopies of her scrawl from almost a year ago, capturing her attention.

_A glance only lasts a second,_

_but the green is eternal,_

_Vast enough to get lost in,_

_And you want to know it._

_You want to know it._

_You want to know it._

“Wow, lots of papers today. More than just a journal, huh?”

The moment the familiar voice hits her ears she snaps her head up and there he is, soft green eyes and lopsided smile and enrapturing and life-like and real.

She’s on her feet in seconds, barreling him with a hug and wanting to say a million things but too out of breath to get any of them out. No, for the time being she settles for holding him as tightly as she can, grateful when his arm wraps around her back to return the embrace.

It’s not until she’s pulling away that she realizes why his hug was one-armed, the other stuck between them. The brace around his wrist answers her first question before she can even begin to ask it, starting a slew of new ones instead.

“Your hand,” she exclaims, astounded at the bandages and stiff posture. Not a speck of clay in sight.

It’s her turn to get the coffee, paying for them both and sliding his across the table to him when she rejoins him.

She learns about the accident. Lucas explains the misfortune at the contracting job, and the doctor’s visits and surgery and physical therapy since then. He apologizes a hundred times over for not getting in contact with her but she waves all of them off, much more relieved to see him now and know he’s at least alive and okay. She also feels relief at the fact that his disappearance had nothing to do with her, but she keeps that to herself.

They allow the conversation to drift, catching up and spending another long afternoon listening to one another talk. Riley tells him all about her progress in the poetry scene, and even slides some of the papers across the table for him to help her sort through. Still none of the ones about him, but there's still time to share those. One day. She figures they’ll get there eventually.

Still, the news of his injury keeps on her mind, and it’s what the conversation ultimately drifts back to by the time they’ve finished their coffee. She examines his braced hand, completely golden with a hint of red from inflammation. No more grey.

“Nerve damage,” he says flatly, staring at his own hand and anxiously picking at the lid of his coffee cup with the other one. He shakes his head, laughing a little in spite of himself even though it’s obvious he doesn’t find anything funny about the situation.

Tentatively, she reaches out and touches his hand. He doesn’t seem opposed to the contact so she gently nudges his palm open, tracing her finger along the lines she can see around the brace. “Can you feel that?”

“I can remember it,” he murmurs, watching her movements. “It’s kind of like a ghost feeling. I know what it’s supposed to feel like, and I remember it. So it’s sort of like I can. My brain playing tricks on me.”

It’s a lot like art, Riley decides. Something his imagination is creating, that he wants to make a reality that he can share with others. She decides she wants to continue to collaborate with him despite their time apart. She wants to create more masterpieces with him, even if it’s something only the two of them share.

“It’s useless,” he mutters. He grimaces, slouching in his seat. “Guess I better find a new dream.”

Riley examines him, feeling her heart rate pick up like tradition. She offers him a smile. “Well, I don’t know if you know this about me, but I’m a pretty good dreamer.”

He matches her smile. Features as soft as ever. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She shrugs, placings her hand on top of his. “It’s the usual grind for a starving artist in New York.”


	4. terminus ( amtrak train, alt. near future )

Lucas considers himself very used to boring train rides.

It’s how he spent all of his travel time during college, going back and forth from Austin and College Station during the holidays. It’s how he got to his internships during junior and senior year. Home for the holidays, back to Asher and Zay’s for Thanksgivings, into the city with his friends for Spring break—for the majority of his time spent pursuing higher education, it feels like he spent it stuck on an Amtrak or something equally mundane, going from one destination to another.

To make matters worse, there’s not a whole lot to see between College Station and Austin. Plenty of farmland. Loads of cattle. Not a lot of interesting.

To Lucas’s dismay, it’s been a bit of a shame to realize that grad school isn’t all that different. Sure, he’s finally in different state—New York, nonetheless. He’s finally on his own, free to be who he wants and live how he wants and figure out how he wants to be on his own terms, and there’s a definite sense of liberty in that. He’s attending the university with the second best veterinary program in the continental United States, and he knows he earned it with his own blood, sweat, and tears (admittedly, a lot of tears).

He worked hard, he fought hard, and he made it.

Despite the awesome of that reality, much of his travel time is, somehow, still spent stuck on an Amtrak and bored out of his mind.

When his mom and dad finally divorced, Grace took it upon herself to take root in a completely different city much like he did. She transplanted her entire life to Chicago, having always liked cold weather and hoping for a little adventure.  In removing Kenneth from the picture, she also made more of an effort to keep up with Lucas. In some ways, he’s grateful for the nearby company, and he has to tell himself that a late relationship with his mother is better than having a strained one. She’s trying, and that’s more than she’s done for most of his life.

Really, he’s only resentful when he’s stuck staring out the window of yet another train car, watching the world fly by in a grey blur and absentmindedly wondering if banging his head against the seat in front of him would give him severe brain damage.

He’s figuring this ride after the holidays is going to be more of the same, until halfway through the ride from Chicago to their stop in Philadelphia when the passenger next to him dozes off and plops her head against his shoulder.

It’s not that he particularly minds—he’d be lying if he claimed he hadn’t noticed how cute she was the moment she hesitated at the seat next to him before asking to sit down. They’d exchanged the usual polite small talk, commented on the chilly Chicago weather, and gone about their own business. She’s not the worst passenger he’s ever had to share space with, no doubt about that.

The only problem is now he has no idea what to do with himself. He’s supposed to be working on his reading for his biology course—another thing that makes him want to bang his head into the seat in front of him—but he’s practically immobile. He has no idea how light of a sleeper this girl is, and hey, maybe she really needs the sleep. He doesn’t want to do anything that may accidentally wake her up.

On the other hand, every time they coast to a stop at another platform he absentmindedly wonders if he should wake her up. He has no idea where she’s supposed to be getting off, and he’s not going to be doing either of them a load of good if he lets her sleep through her station. He debates with himself internally on the matter for about five stops before he decides he has to do something.

Her ticket is tucked into the book she brought, stuffed into the pouch on the back of the seat in front of her. Lucas can make out the details on the edge of the ticket, but not enough is visible for him to figure out where the hell she’s going.

Although part of him finds the idea of looking through her things reprehensible, he knows he’s going to go nuts with the whole guilt complex thing if he doesn’t do something about it and besides, she _is_ using him as a pillow. He can get away with a little investigating for her own good.

Moving as slowly and discretely as possible, Lucas leans forward just slightly and stretches his hand out in the direction of her seat pocket. It’s further away than it looks, and he chews his lip in concentration as his fingers brush the top of the book jacket. So close, yet so far.

He feels her adjust on his shoulder, causing him to freeze. He realizes he’s holding his breath.

Glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, he watches as she frowns slightly, crinkling her nose and slouching more comfortably in the corner of her chair—and, effectively, more securely into his shoulder. She doesn’t open her eyes.

He exhales, staring up at the ceiling of the train before focusing his attention back on the book. It’s a much harder task now that she’s so contentedly snuggled up closer to him. He just manages to grab it by the edges, gently lifting it from the pocket and grimacing in anticipation of accidentally dropping it.

The book lands on top of his textbook. Lucas grins and leans back in his seat, dancing a bit in victory before remembering the reason he was being so careful in the first place. He checks to make sure she’s still asleep, awkwardly patting the air above her head in a pseudo-calming gesture before flipping to the page where the ticket is stuck.

He doesn’t know what he’s expecting when opens the book, but what he finds isn’t it.

Amongst the pages, his sleepy friend has really left her mark. All along the margins are little notes in different colored ink—notably, purple—where she’s jotted her thoughts down about whatever is going on in the narrative. In black, she notes moments of prose she really enjoyed. In yellow, she underlines certain lines and writes _Peaches_ next to them. A similar pattern is shown through green ink, where she’s written the word _Farkle._ He’s not even sure what that word means.

Regardless of how the entries mean absolutely nothing to him, he can tell how important they are to her without even knowing her. It’s obvious how much energy she puts into picking this book apart, experiencing every single last bit of its prose and taking every moment to heart. He wonders if this one he’s apprehended is something special, or if she reads every book this way. If maybe she just looks at the world this way.

Suddenly, he feels as though he’s been doing a lot of drifting through life. Not enough writing in the margins. Not enough living.

Her head nuzzles lightly against his shoulder, snapping him out of it as her hands come up to share the arm rest with him and bump his elbow in the process. He swallows, refocusing his attention to the ticket and lifting it lightly from the pages.

 _Pittsburgh, PA_ to _Philadelphia, PA._ A cheaper ticket than his, but she’s going a shorter distance. In any case, it’s a station they’ll all have to get off on—where he’ll be changing trains—so at least he can relax knowing he’s not going to let her fly right past her destination.

The effort to put the book back is even more of a struggle than retrieving it, but he manages after a couple of painful minutes of maneuvering and more than a few side-eyes from the passengers across the aisle from them. He knows he looks sketchy. He feels a little sketchy, having seen more than he thinks he was supposed to of this complete stranger from her reading material.

Too late now. He lets it go, settling back into his seat. He adjusts himself to make his shoulder as easily accessible as possible—he figures he’s going to be stuck like this for a while—before getting back into his reading. With peace of mind, it’s a bit easier to focus.

Margins girl doesn’t rouse until they’re a few minutes out from the Philly station, the conductor coming over the PA system to let them know they’ll be arriving shortly and reminding them that everyone will be leaving the car at this stop. When the PA crackles on she jumps awake, hesitating close to his shoulder for half a second before she really wakes up.

When she realizes her position she snaps upright, a look of vague horror on her face as she stares at the seat back in front of them. He doesn’t comment on the situation on her behalf, but he can see her stealing glances at him out of the corner of her eye and he can practically feel the embarrassment radiating off of her.

“Did I—,” she starts timidly, voice raspy with sleep. She clears her throat, still not looking at him directly. “Was I asleep?”

Lucas nods slowly, wondering if he should verbally respond. “Yeah.”

She blinks, mouth parted open in shock that she can’t seem to shake off. She mouths words that don’t come out before restarting, closing her eyes and clearing her throat. “How long was I asleep?”

He shrugs, offering a pleasant tone in an effort to make her feel better. “Not long.”

“ _When_ did I fall asleep?”

There’s a pause.

“Akron?”

“Oh my God,” she breathes, making an indistinct noise of horror in the back of her throat before turning her apologetic gaze on him. He’s taken by those cute brown eyes again, although he attempts to stay focused. “I’m so sorry.”

Another shrug as he closes his textbook. “It wasn’t a big deal. Not like I died because of it. Just a minor inconvenience,” he explains as they gather their things, correcting himself almost immediately. “If even that. Really, not a problem.”

She huffs, obviously not believing him. “Minor inconvenience. Dying. What’s the difference?”

“Death,” he says flatly. “I’d say death is the difference.”

She tosses him a disdainful look, only to break into a bashful smile halfway through. She rises from her seat and leads the way out into the aisle. When they’re stuck waiting for other passengers to grab their things, she gives him another beam. “I’m Riley, by the way. Figure I owe you that much considering I used you as a pillow the entire ride. Hope I didn’t drool on you too badly.”

“I’m sure the denim is waterproof enough for that,” Lucas assures her, shrugging his jacket-clad shoulder at her. When she grins, he can’t help but smile back. “I’m Lucas.”

“I love it,” she says cheerfully, eyes widening again in slight embarrassment before she quickly changes the subject. “So, what brings you to Philadelphia? Where were you coming from? You were already on board when I got on in Pittsburgh.”

“Yeah, I’ve been on this train longer than me or my legs would’ve liked,” he admits as the line starts moving. She’s having a bit of trouble getting her luggage from the top rack so he reaches up to help her, earning another bashful grin in return. “I’m coming from Chicago. Family lives out there.”

“Did you visit them for the holidays?”

“Yep.” They start moving, the line of passengers leading them towards the exit. “Pretty good visit, to be honest. Better than usual.”

He doesn’t know why he’s opening up to her so easily—he doesn’t like to waste his breath when he knows no one is really listening to him anyway—but for some reason he gets the feeling she actually cares about what he has to say.

There’s a twinkle in her eyes at the mention of the season. “That’s so nice. I’m glad you had such a good time.”

“Why were you in Pittsburgh? Family, too?”

“No, actually. Well, yes, but not literally.” She descends down the steps and onto the chilly platform, spinning to wait for him as he drops down behind her. Flurries of snow greet them. “My best friend and uncle live out there. He’s in his last year of grad school for psychology, and she’s working on her art.”

His expression is puzzled. “Your friend… and your uncle?”

“Oh, right, right,” she says with a laugh, shaking her head. She hesitates as she takes a moment to situate her knit cap on her head, purple just like most of her pen ink. “I always forget how weird that sounds. My uncle was a late in life baby, so he’s only a couple years older than me. More like an older cousin than an uncle, to be honest. But by lineage, he’s my uncle.”

“Ah, gotcha.”

“It sounds so crazy, I must’ve sounded really wild for a second there.” He shrugs again and she smiles, tilting her head at him as they head into the station. “So, do you live in Philadelphia?”

“Actually, no. I’m just changing trains. Gotta catch the train to New York.”

He swears her face falls a bit. He has no idea why. “Oh. What’s in New York?”

“School. I’m a grad student at Cornell.”

“Cornell!” she exclaims, raising her eyebrows. “Well, you must be quite the smarty-pants. What are you studying?”

He waves her off, thankful when a wave of hot air hits them when they step through the doors into the busy train station. “Veterinary medicine. I’m really not that smart, trust me, just really, really, stubbornly dedicated.”

“Well, I bet you’re selling yourself short,” she says, eyes sparkling. Along with her nice features and pretty eyes, he can’t help but notice how lovely her hair looks with snowflakes caught in it. He doesn’t think he’s ever met anyone as disarmingly endearing as her. “And I’m sure you’ll make a wonderful veterinarian someday.”

“Well, thanks,” he says with a laugh.

Now that they’re stuck in the station and effectively out of places to go, it seems like time to say good-bye. Despite how much Lucas resents these boring train rides, he suddenly doesn’t want to leave the station. He doesn’t want to go anywhere. He’s perfectly fine standing here in the middle of the terminal until the snow melts outside.

She hesitates, examining him happily and casting a quick glance down to his lips before offering him another smile. “Well, it was really nice to meet you, Lucas.”

“You too, Riley.”

She smiles at the use of her name, nodding pointedly. “Thanks for letting me use you as a pillow. You were very comfortable.”

He laughs again, dropping his head down and nodding until he can bring himself to meet her eyes again. “Anytime.”

Seems like a bit of a shame that for all intents and purposes, that statement doesn’t hold a lot of water. In a few minutes they’re going to part ways, and he’s never going to see her again.

They exchange a few more words in an attempt to prolong the inevitable before they finally part ways, offering each other half-hearted waves. Lucas spins to face the signs leading him to yet another platform, letting out a sigh. He starts heading in the direction of the east-bound trains, stuffing his phone into his sweatshirt pocket and adjusting his bag more securely on his shoulder.

Back to the usual.

“Lucas!”

The shout and the pounding of footsteps against the marble floor is enough to get him to hesitate, turning around just as Riley nearly collides with him. He steps back as she maneuvers around him, breathlessly coming to stand in front of him.

“I was just—,” Her eyes are wide. She looks a little uncertain, but there’s determination in her features. A little grit to mix with the charming. “Would you maybe want to grab a coffee? Or something? You know, if you have the time.”

It seems a little silly, getting coffee with a stranger he’ll probably never see again. He should just head to the right platform and wait around for a couple hours until the train is ready to board, like he’s always done. He’s an expert at boring train rides. That isn’t going to change.

“I know it’s crazy, and it’s totally fine if you’re in a hurry,” she explains hastily. She licks her lips, obviously trying to find the right words to convince him. “It’s just I… I feel like I know you.” She pauses. “Or, at least, I’d like to.”

The statement is absolutely ludicrous. But if he’s being honest, he kind of gets what she means. In some strange way, there’s something in those bright brown eyes that makes him feel like somehow, he knows her too.

Maybe it’s time to stop letting life cart him around from place to place, just drifting along for the ride. Maybe it’s time to start writing in the margins.

“Yeah,” he says, unable to hold back his grin. “Yeah, I’d really like that.”

The smile that blooms across her face makes every second of time spent on transit in the last six years of his life worth it. Because somehow, it brought him here to this moment with her.

They head in the direction of the café, walking side by side and tossing each other shy smiles.

“I like your sweatshirt, by the way.”

“Thanks.”

She smirks. “I don’t know why it says Brooklyn, though. Shouldn’t it say Ithaca? I think it’s a bit misleading.”

“Somehow,” he says with an eye roll, appreciating the nudge she gives him as she stuffs her hands in her coat pockets. “I think this is going to be fun.”


	5. split ( alt. new york, near future )

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You just found me in the wrong universe. That’s all. Because you could have loved me forever. And maybe in another universe, I let you.” -- Gaby Dunn

If there’s one thing Lucas has always appreciated, it’s silence.

Most of his favorite people can’t seem to stand it. Zay talks up a storm even if no one else particularly feels like talking just so the air won’t feel so empty. Farkle fills the silences in some ways to hear his own voice; Asher fills the silences because to him, silence feels like being alone, and he’s never particularly liked being alone.

Lucas has never minded being alone. Silence is the only sign he has that his world isn’t spinning out of control—and he only really feels it when his mind decides to shut up too. It’s rare, and unique, and he treasures it more often than not. Silence is far from suffocating—it’s freeing. Silence is, after all, golden.

For the first time, the silence on the other end of the line is deafening.

If he’s being honest, this wasn’t a cold that creeped in during a short period of time. It felt sudden, like an ice storm, but in his heart he knows the frost was forming between the two of them long before he finally decided to pick up the phone and call. Enough text conversations that used to go on endlessly that ended in a couple minutes. Enough questions of concern that were brushed off with reassurance.

_Nothing’s wrong. No complaints here. If I had something to tell you, you know I would._

Sitting curled up on his mattress with the phone pressed to his ear and nothing but radio silence on the other end, he knows it’s not true. Everything wrong. To him, everything is wrong.

“Riley.”

“Yeah?” She says it with her usual amount of pep, but it’s still like she’s not really there. Like she’s dialing it in from two-thousand miles away, even though they haven’t actually called in weeks.

“Just wanted to see if you were still there.”

“Oh, yeah. I am.”

More silence. Lucas watches the clock on his desk tick up a minute. Another minute of nothing.

“I know we already talked about this,” he begins uncertainly, feeling that uneasy rush in the center of his wrists. Adrenaline coursing through him over a conversation he wishes he never had to have. “But are you… are you sure there’s nothing going on? Nothing you want to talk about?”

Riley hums, obviously thinking about it. “No, I really don’t think so. You know I would have said something.”

“I know. I just want you to know, you know, that if there is something, I want to talk about it. So we can fix it. I’m here to talk about it.”

“I know. You’ve told me.”

Although she speaks confidently enough, there’s an edge to her voice that leaves him wondering. Like there always is. He knows he could just hang up the phone and leave it there like they have for the past couple months, but something keeps him from making that move. A piece of him that’s worn and ragged from stressing over every possible scenario that could’ve gone wrong in the last few weeks.

“Because I just… things have been different lately. Haven’t they? I mean, when you talk to someone all the time and then suddenly days go by without having even a chat, it’s just a little weird. A little disorienting.”

Riley’s pause is long. He can practically imagine her twiddling her jellybean necklace between her fingers. Although, he doesn’t know if she even wears it anymore. “Yeah, I would definitely say that.”

“So you’ve noticed it, too. That something is off. That we’re…” He swallows, forcing himself to be assertive. “That we’re not really talking.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely weird,” she admits.

Silence. More bone-crushing silence. Lucas swallows again. “I mean, that doesn’t really seem right, does it? That’s not how best friends should act around each other. Let alone boyfriend and girlfriend. So what happened?”

The pause is shorter this time. But Riley’s voice is softer. “Lucas…”

“What happened? If we figure it out, then we can work it out and try to see where we need to go from here.” He wipes his palms on his jeans nervously as they begin to sweat. He can feel his chest constricting, forcing a deep breath. “What did I do?”

“Nothing. Lucas, you didn’t do anything,” she says reassuringly. In spite of the emotional upheaval Lucas can feel coming a mile away, her voice is impressively calm. It always is in times of crisis. “I don’t know what happened. Things just… a lot of change is going on for me right now. You know with changing majors so late and coming off of how hard last year was and everything.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah. So I’m just in this really weird place right now and I don’t know, I guess that’s just impacting things.”

“Right.” Lucas swallows again, but this time it physically hurts. He scratches his eyebrow for the sake of doing something. “Yeah, I totally get that. Well, you know, I’m here to talk whenever you want.”

“I know that.”

Silence settles over them again. Lucas could hang up and continue to leave it unfinished, continue to keep the door open, like he has for the last few empty phone calls. He wants to, but his thoughts form words that spill out of his mouth before he can stop them.

“But this isn’t really how boyfriend and girlfriend are supposed to be.” His tone is flat despite the question. “Is it?”

Another moment of silence. Riley’s voice is softer than ever. He can visualize her sympathetic smile so perfectly it almost hurts.

“No. It’s not.”

He thinks of a million and one things he could say. He could attempt to reroute the conversation, earn back her attention, attribute the sudden strain in their relationship to the distance or the political climate or the weather. But the fact of the matter is, this is the way fate decided to hand it to him. For all he’s survived, how hard he’s worked, fate always loves to knock him down again to remind him just how little  control he really has.

Because the fact of the matter is, Riley’s decided it’s time to move on. And she’s decided without him.

“Right. Okay. Good to know.”

“It’s not… there’s no hard feelings. You didn’t do anything. Things are just… it’s probably better this way.” He thinks he hears a sniffle, but he’s pretty sure he’s imagining it. Imagining emotion he wishes was there that isn’t. “I love you, Lucas. Really.”

“Right. Okay.” It’s all he can manage to get out before his hands start to shake and he nearly drops the phone. “Good to know.”

He swipes to end the call before tossing it to the other end of the bed. He overshoots and it tumbles off the edge of the mattress, causing him to curse and crawl over to check if it’s broken.

The phone is fine. But something else still feels shattered.

He rolls onto his back and collapses, staring at the ceiling. Once again, nothing is going the way it’s supposed to. He wants to feel something; angry, upset, wounded. He wants to throw something or cry, despite how much he hates crying. He wants something to make sense, for the natural order of things to take over.

But he doesn’t. He doesn’t cry. He doesn’t feel anything. It’s just empty inside, like the last few phone calls and months of two minute conversations.

Radio silence.

* * *

For how deep the break-up hits, Lucas finds it surprisingly easy to pretend like everything is fine.

As his mother used to say, he’s always been a “trooper,” and for once that label starts to make sense to him. He continues to go to class and work hard and engage with his friends. He keeps his eye on the prize of grad school at Davis next fall and a veterinary practice of his own. During the day, when he’s on the go and on the run, it’s easy to forget that something is missing. That something is wrong.

The only indication to any outsider that something is amiss would be if they stepped foot in his dorm room, which has slowly declined into a disaster area. Considering his naturally finicky personality, he’s amazed he’s managing to survive in it.

His residents, thankfully, don’t seem to notice he’s in any sort of distress. He prefers it that way, as he’s supposed to be there for them rather than the other way around. Cece comments that he’s doing a much better job of coping than she anticipated, considering “how important and like, everything, Riley was” to him. Sanjay starts a bit where he pretends he has no idea who Riley Matthews is. “Is that some celebrity we’ve never talked about before? Is that some Texas urban legend? Sounds fake, but okay.”

Lucas appreciates the support, but the degradation of her doesn’t make him feel much better. She doesn’t deserve the harsh humor, even if it’s out of good intentions. It’s not fair.

Nothing about the situation is fair. He’s learning he just has to deal with it. Being the one dropped rather than the one doing the dropping, it’s his burden to carry.

He daydreams about it sometimes—wondering if he would’ve felt better beating her to it. He felt the freeze out coming, he knows he did, and perhaps he could have beat her to the punch. Then it would be him with the power, with the emotional freedom, moving on without looking back. He figures maybe she’d rethink it if she had to be the one left behind, stuck with all the debris.

But he knows he wouldn’t have. He wouldn’t have, because dropping her was never part of his agenda. Not something he ever considered, no matter how occasional their conversations became.

“Of course, I’m fine,” he promises Zay over the phone, deflated in his desk chair. He glances out the window towards the campus, where the sky has turned cloudy grey to match the uncharacteristically cold weather they’ve been having this semester.

Chilly in Texas in the early winter? Sure. Cold? Don’t count on it.

But then, he guesses, it’s pretty fitting. Just another swift kick from reality. He absolutely loves friendly reminders.

A curt knock on his door stirs him out of his daze. He gets to his feet, adjusting his grip on the phone. “Look, a resident needs me, so I gotta go. Yes, I’m still coming back to New York for break. I promise.”

Another knock. More impatient this time.

“No, I’m not just going to _Gone Girl_ this business and disappear. Please have some faith in me.” He rolls his eyes at Zay’s dramatics. “I’ll see you in like a week. Bye.”

By the time he’s off the phone the knocking has grown constant and incessant. Whatever this freshman needs, they’re definitely not giving up.

When he looks through the peephole and opens the door, it’s not who he’s expecting. It’s not a freshman at all.

Marissa storms into the room in all her self-assured glory, dressed for the winter as if she’s going skiing rather than hanging out on a college campus in the middle of the South. With her scarf wrapped around her neck and fuzzy hat perched over her dark hair, she may as well be back in Colorado.

“Finally. Lucas Friar, what if I was a choking resident? I would have died on your watch and then you’d have a lawsuit on your hands. Then you’d have _real_ problems.”

“Thanks, I’ll think about that,” he says sarcastically, closing the door behind her. Considering her status as a fellow RA who knows the grind of the job, he isn’t inclined to take her criticism seriously. “But that begs the question, what _are_ you doing here?”

She huffs, marching further into the room. With her own personal flair for dramatics, he’s reminded of how much she reminds him of some weird hybrid between Zay and Maya. A tiny part of him stings, thinking of the ways she also reminds him of Riley.

“Saving you. Rescuing you from your sad, post-break-up depression before it swallows you whole and leaves this universe with one less pretty face.” She stops suddenly, looking around her at the disarray of his space. She wrinkles her nose. “Good thing I came when I did. This place is a heap.”

“Look, I’m fine,” he assures her, marching into the room after her. He casually kicks a pile of laundry under the bed and out of sight. “You’ve seen me like, every day this week. I go to class. I’m working on my grad school applications. What more could you ask for?”

Marissa rolls her eyes. “You’re forgetting I went through a break-up just under a year ago. I know the signs. I know what I’m looking for.”

“Wow, was that really a year ago?”

“Fall semester is poison for long distance relationships. Especially the good ones. It gets them all eventually.” She shrugs, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “So, get bundled up. We’re going out.”

“I really don’t feel like partying,” he says defensively. He’s never been into the party scene, but asking him to go now just seems like an insult.

Another eye roll. “We’re not partying, Goldie. I’m just going to take you for coffee. Will you please put your sweatshirt on so we can go?”

After a couple more minutes of griping and commenting on Lucas’s inability to move with an ounce of urgency, the two of them are stepping out into the chilly afternoon.

Marissa stuffs her hands into her pockets, eyeing Lucas as he inhales deeply. The crisp air feels strange in his lungs. “Feels good, doesn’t it?”

“Weird. But not unwelcome.”

She nods. “It’s like I said. Been there. I swear, you think you’re doing fine just by getting through the day but you don’t even realize how much time you’re spending alone cooped up. It creeps up on you in a way where you think you have it handled...”

“Got to be different though,” Lucas mutters, crossing his arms. He keeps his eyes on the pavement as they walk, letting her lead the way. “I mean, ending things the way you did with a big fight and everything. When something explodes, there’s more to prepare for and recover from.”

“Um, not like it was the most exciting thing I’ve ever experienced, but sure.”

“At least there was something to pinpoint as to what went wrong.” He can feel his own embitterment crawling up the back of his throat, sour like venom. He swallows, frowning at the cracks in the sidewalk. “At least you had an active role in the decision.”

“Yes, truly, being able to spit in his face and tell him I hated him even though it wasn’t true was the highlight of my semester last year.” She gives him a look, making him feel sheepish and entirely selfish. But her glare softens quickly. “Look, the break-up with Ryan sucked. I mean, it really sucked. But I don’t know if having it happen with a bang like it did or having it sort of just fall apart would’ve been any better or worse. It hurts no matter what. All you can do is move on.”

“I am moving on.”

“I mean, really move on. Not convince yourself you are and compartmentalize instead. Been there, remember?”

Lucas’s voice is small. “I don’t even know how to do that.”

Marissa examines him, before scooting closer and linking her arm through his. “The hardest part is getting that first breath of fresh air. Now, you’re ready to try.”

He doesn’t believe her, but he’s glad she’s there. She gives him a smile, nodding proudly as they continue to walk to the campus coffee shop.

* * *

By the time Lucas touches down at JFK for the holiday break, he’s convinced himself he really is over it. He’s moved on. It doesn’t faze him anymore.

It’s disorienting how untrue that is the moment he steps through the doors to the baggage claim. For the last three years, it’s always been Riley who greeted him in varying levels of excitement when he reentered the world of the Northeast. Always with a hug, always with a smile and an exclamation of how happy she was to see him again. One time with tears, but they were the good kind.

This time, it’s his mother who waves at him from the curb outside the park and ride area. The Matthews are nowhere in sight. She gives him a hug, but it’s nowhere near as excited or certain as the previous homecoming hugs have been.

In some ways, he can’t fault her. It's as uncertain as he feels, standing on suddenly shaky ground. Going back to the same old apartment doesn’t help matters. He’s never liked the place, with its empty atmosphere and creaky groans of abandonment.

Only now, it’s haunted too.

Everywhere he turns, it’s like he can feel the ghost of Riley inhabiting the room. Reminding him of the color she used to bring to the space before bleeding it dry and disappearing, leaving nothing behind. Not only did she drop him off the radar without consulting him, she robbed him too. Every positive memory he has of the place from the last few years is suddenly a little bit tainted, a little bit cold, a little bit off. Like they’re not his to hold anymore.

He ignores his father ignoring his return and heads straight to his room. When he drops his bag on the bed and looks around at the nearly empty room, the ghost-like feeling is almost unbearable. The room itself barely has anything left to admire—everything is either stuck at the Matthews where he usually spent his time or back at school—but it’s full to bursting with her. She’s taking up so much of the space there’s nowhere to breathe.

It’s remarkable, how often he feels like he can’t breathe.

* * *

“Maybe I should’ve just stayed at school,” he thinks out loud with Zay as they walk through Central Park, a habit they fell into back in high school that they never dropped. It’s practically tradition now, and Lucas was grateful for the excuse to leave the apartment. “You know, kept working at the internship. They pay, and everything. Probably would’ve been more useful.”

“Um, and not hang out with your best friend and one and only? Bitch, I think perhaps not.” Zay aims a kick at his shin that he just narrowly avoids. “You absolutely have the right to be back here. Like yeah, it’s gonna hurt for a while, but you’ll get over it. You both will.”

“That’s the thing, I’m pretty sure she already did.” Lucas chews the inside of his cheek, trying not to let his emotions get the best of him. What surfaced after the initial shock is mostly resentment, and bouts of fury, and he doesn’t want to get himself too riled up lest he say something he regrets. “I was never the one who wanted to move on from anything. I never felt like we had to. So she’s leagues ahead of me.”

“I don’t know, man. Sometimes relationships just don’t work out. All you can do is focus on the relationships that are still working—cough, me, cough—and fuck the rest. It’s not worth getting all worked up over. You can do better.”

“You’re telling me I can do better than Riley Erica Matthews?”

Zay hesitates. “Alright, whatever, she’s pretty wonderful. We all know this. But I’m just saying, you’re pretty wonderful, too. And you didn’t deserve this, that’s true, but focus on the stuff that you do deserve. The good stuff. The rest is bullshit, you know? Not worth being angry over.”

Lucas absorbs this, trying to put it into practice. Wishing he had the ability like Riley to just pull away when the time is right. Or at least, when she deemed it right. “I guess.”

“Besides, we’re all going to get so plastered at the New Year’s party this year it’s like it won’t even matter. We’re legal now, Mr. Matthews! What are you going to do about it? Pitch me off the roof?”

A sudden rush of panic shoots through Lucas, and he feels that pounding in his wrists again. He blinks. “The party.”

“Yeah, you know. That thing that happens every year.”

He shakes his head slowly, almost robotically. He’s having trouble processing exactly what emotions are going through his head at that moment. “I can’t go. I can’t go to that.”

Zay blinks at him, realizing the issue. New Year’s, like everything else in New York, is seemingly another thing that Riley Matthews owns—leaving a void in its place. “Oh, right. Well, um, look, I’m sure you’re still invited. Like, Riley would never make a big deal out of anything that would put a rift between the group. I mean, especially since you said she’s over it. Like, it’ll be okay.”

“No, I just, I can’t,” Lucas says. It’s hard to swallow. His throat feels tight. “I just… I can’t.”

He wishes he had the words, but they’ve evaded him once again. Once again, he’s just left with an empty feeling, radio silence in his brain and all throughout his body.

Zay examines him, before backing off. He nods. “Okay. No, you’re right. We won’t go. We’ll just do something. You know my family would dig having you over. I’ll tell them we’re doing it small this year. Whatever.”

Lucas nods a thank you, still somehow out of words. It’s almost like she’s taken that too.

* * *

When he gets back to his room later that night and settles in the void again, his emotions finally come back to him. Only this time, it’s nothing but anger.

A quick trip on social media doesn’t help matters. Underneath Farkle’s pretentious photo of his flight back from Mississippi, there’s Riley with a charming photo of her family in front of their freshly decorated tree. All smiles, beautiful, as powerful and peppy as always. As if nothing’s changed.

_Most wonderful time of the year. Favorite time, favorite people, favorite place._

Before he questions it, he goes to her profile and hits the unfollow button. Immediately, her photos disappear, the after effects of leaving a profile set to private.

He hates feeling this resentful towards her. But she’s so happy, so content, looking towards the future with so much pride and hope when she just left him behind in the dust. Romantic entanglement aside, it’s as if he was never in her life to begin with. Not even a favorite person anymore. That fast.

No friendship. No memories. Nothing.

Resentment fuels him to go onto other apps, unfollowing accounts and wiping her from his online existence. He doesn’t spend much time online anyway, but just the action of doing something feels cathartic in some way. As if, for one second of this hell, he has control again.

Before he can stop himself he’s on his feet, heading over to his desk and grabbing folders from high school. All the stuff he deemed worthy of keeping. He drops them on the bed, sitting down and starting to pull out all of it—photos, papers, anything that felt relevant the last time he looked through them on a visit back from college.

She’s there. She’s everywhere. While she can so easily remove him from her life, he feels like there’s not one piece of his she hasn’t infiltrated. She gets the friends, the city, and the power to move on like it never even mattered. And all he gets is empty rooms and tainted memories and the emotional cocktail of being left behind.

He feels the hot tears on his cheeks before he really registers the emotion, frowning and immediately ripping whatever is in his hands. The strips on the bed in front of him look like a photo of the six of them, doing something silly and fun during their senior year. He could piece it back together and see the full picture, but it doesn’t feel worth it. His throat hurts too much to care.

Instead, he takes the next paper available to him, covered with Riley’s bubbly handwriting. A note conversation they’d passed together throughout a history class.

Biting his lip, he tears that apart too. In a frenzy he rips through every scrap of history he stored between the two of them, shredding them as quickly as it feels like she shredded hers.

In no time at all, all he’s left with is damp cheeks and paper carnage and that pain in the back of his throat he knows isn’t going to go away for a while. That and the memories that, even shattered, still feel like her ghost.

* * *

“Whatever you’re planning, I don’t want it.”

“You always say that,” Zay says with an eye roll as he drags Lucas down to their favorite pizza place during the last week of break. “And yet, aren’t you always glad when I reveal my devious plan?”

“No. Not usually.”

“Everybody’s a critic.”

Lucas can’t help but note the fact that if things were different, they’d probably be heading towards Topanga’s right now. The pizza place is one of their favorites, but it’s always played second fiddle to the café. The only reason they’re here, he knows, is because he doesn’t belong there anymore. Another thing taken from him without his consent.

When they walk through the door, Zay stops and exhales a great sigh. He grins, gesturing ahead of him. “Excellent. Just as I’d planned. Surprise.”

Farkle raises his eyebrows, smirking as he gets to his feet to greet them. Lucas is more than shocked to see him—he was pretty sure they weren’t going to see each other again. He was Riley’s friend first, and he’s always been quick to move on. Emotions aren’t really his thing, and Lucas figured he would nod along if Riley told him the cord had been cut.

Free as a bird.

“What are you doing here?”

“Oh, he’s charming right now,” Farkle snorts. Somehow, he’s gained even more height since the last time they saw each other. He raises an eyebrow at Zay. “He must be really down in the dumps if he can’t even manage a polite, _Lucas the Good_ greeting.”

“Yeah, he’s a train wreck, alright,” Zay agrees. “I’m getting pizza. Don’t wait up.”

Farkle watches over his shoulder as Zay disappears towards the line before turning his inquisitive gaze back to Lucas. He tilts his head slightly. “Well? Why the freak face? I have to admit, I was expecting a more emotional reunion. Especially from you.”

“Nothing. I just—,” Lucas hesitates, trying to find the words. “I didn’t know if we were going to see each other again. Considering.”

“Yeah, considering. We all know about it. Word travels fast in our group, you know that. With you bailing on New Year’s and everything, it was even more obvious that this was a big old mess. But no, of course I’m going to see you. What would I do without my face?”

Lucas doesn’t know what to say. It’s weird, suddenly having something you thought was gone for good come back to you without a second thought. Almost as jolting as losing something the same way.

“Now, come on,” Farkle says with a sigh, gesturing Lucas forward. “Bring it in.”

He gives him a look. “You _want_ to hug me?”

“I mean, not particularly. I don’t want to hug anyone, except Isadora, usually. But you could definitely use one and I guess I’m feeling generous today.” He holds his arms out. “Come on, don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”

After a moment Lucas relents, moving forward and giving him a hug. Farkle’s response is somewhat lackluster, as it typically is, but the gesture has the reassuring effect he was aiming for. Even the pitiful pat on the back somehow makes Lucas feel a little bit better.

He tightens his embrace, exhaling with relief and holding onto the reality that for all intents and purposes, the entire world hasn’t collapsed at his feet. Even when things are spinning out of control, some things will hold their shape.

Just for a moment, it’s a little easier to breathe.

* * *

Moving into spring semester, Lucas starts to find the strength to really move on.

It takes time, and some days are better than others. There are days of impressive energy and life, where he breezes through the toughest of his tasks looking towards graduation, where he doesn’t even have a moment to think about it. His friends, both at school and back home, repopulate his life and start to fill up the space left in his chest that makes it hard to breathe.

There are the days where it’s still hard. There are the days where the emotions come back full swing, whether it’s resentment, or bitterness, or hurt, plain and simple. But it’s further and fewer between. Slowly, the wounds start to mend. Slowly, he finds himself spending less time thinking about it, regardless of the emotion in play.

Slowly, he starts to come out on the other side.

Not completely bogged down in his own emotional hurricane, he starts to see the world from other perspectives again. He acknowledges Marissa’s own experience with a similar situation, really appreciating her early advice for what is was and making sure to let her know the support is one hundred percent mutual. Both of them agree—fight or sudden freeze-out aside, none of them are going anywhere. They’ve got each other until the end.

It isn’t until he reaches this place that he recognizes how often and how insidiously this happens, even with other people in his life. A lunch with Asher one day when he decides to visit campus illuminates this perfectly.

“It happened with me and Dylan,” he explains between bites of his sandwich. He’s mostly nonchalant, but Lucas can see the slight sting still echoing in his expression. He figures a little bit of venom will always be there when things end so suddenly. “You know, it wasn’t like anybody did anything wrong. And I know it’s different because like, romantic relationship versus friendship, but it still hurts. Probably mostly the same way. He kind of just decided we weren’t really friends anymore, and I had to live with it. But I don’t think it was mean-spirited or anything. He just didn’t want to try anymore. And he had that right, I guess.”

“You haven’t talked to him about it?”

“Not since our last conversation a couple years ago, no.” Asher takes the final bite of his sandwich, leaning back in his chair and shrugging. “There wasn’t anything left to say. But I don’t know. Some friendships aren’t meant to last forever. You take it for what it is, and hold on to the ones that are still there. And yeah it sucks, I mean a lot, and for a while you won’t be able to really enjoy the good parts that were left behind. But someday you will. And you’ll be glad they happened, for better or worse.”

Although he initially doubts it, it’s surprising how Asher’s words slowly turn out to be true. As the semester comes to an end and he prepares for graduation, it becomes easier to be reminiscent. He can look back on memories and photos from his time with her, and it doesn’t feel so painful anymore.

Besides, with all the emotions present as his friends spend their last days in college together and he prepares to move on to the next chapter of his life, there’s plenty of new memories being made.

Whatever happened, it doesn’t stop the future from plowing on forward. And he wants to be present for whatever is coming next.

* * *

Air back in his lungs, the subsequent trip to New York for the summer is much easier than the previous. Time turned winter to summer, and life returned to the city as it always does. It healed wounds, as it always does. And despite the harsh changes of the past year, some pieces stay the same.

“Cheers, mates,” Farkle says, clinking his drink against the others as they raise a glass to graduation and whatever is coming next. He downs his shot, shaking his head slightly and shuddering. “Satisfying.”

“Farkle, you studied abroad for one semester,” Zay snaps. “If you say anything else remotely British, I’ll murder you.”

“Big talk.” Farkle slides out of the booth, but not before giving Isadora a quick peck on the cheek. “I’m getting some water. Anyone else need anything?”

Lucas shakes his head. Zay raises his eyebrows. “Water already? After one shot. Big talk!”

“Are you saying you don’t want a water?”

“No, I’ll take one. I’ll help carry.” Zay gets up as well, nudging Farkle before turning his gaze to Lucas. “Gonna see what may be hanging out at the bar. Sure you don’t want to come, Lucas? Rebound could be right around the corner.”

Considering the time that’s passed, rebound seems like an improper term. But Lucas shakes his head regardless. “I’m good. Don’t kill each other on the walk over.”

“No promises.”

Isadora watches them walk off, turning her pleasant smile to Lucas. Despite how long it’s been since they’ve seen each other, Lucas appreciates how there’s still an easy atmosphere between them. Ever since sophomore year, she’s always been one of his favorite people to be around. Another person who appreciates the silence.

For so long recently, silence has felt suffocating. It’s a relief to feel relaxed once again.

“I’m really sorry about what happened with Riley,” Isadora states uncertainly, obviously attempting to gauge whether this topic can be breached or not. “It was a surprise to hear about it.”

“Trust me, you’re not the only one who thinks so,” he murmurs. He manages a shrug, offering a smile that doesn’t feel entirely forced like in the past. “But it’s old news. Time heals all wounds, and whatever.”

“Have you seen her since?” At his head shake, Isadora furrows her eyebrows. “Do you still love her?”

He’s shocked at the question, but more so because of how unprepared he is to answer rather than the fact that it was asked in the first place. Isadora has always been curious and always been painfully blunt—something like this was bound to come up.

But it’s a shock to realize he’s never let himself think about it. Since the break-up he’s spent so much time decontextualizing the situation in his head—blaming himself, villainizing her while knowing it was unfair, removing her entirely. Being asked so point-blank what he actually feels about her is something he hasn’t had a second to consider.

“Yeah, I guess,” he admits. He fingers the top of his glass, focusing on the condensation dripping down the side rather than his inquisitive friend. “I think I always will. First love and all that, but also because of everything we shared together. She chose to end it, but I never prepared myself for that. So those memories are always going to be with me in a way I don’t think I can change. Even if I try to rewrite history—and trust me, I’ve tried—she’s always going to be Riley. The person I loved more than anyone else in the world. Part of that will always be true.”

She nods slowly, obviously fascinated. It’s clear this is much more of a social experiment to her than a serious inquiry of his well-being, although he doesn’t doubt her sincerity is genuine. “It is a shame it didn’t work out.”

Lucas shrugs. “Sometimes people leave. I guess.”

“Well, at least in this universe.” She tilts her head, taking a small sip of her drink. “You’ve heard of the multiverse theory, right?”

He shakes his head, giving her an intrigued look. She immediately smiles, anticipation stemming from a teaching moment.

“Essentially, there’s this whole idea of chaos theory, in which every decision we make, even the most miniscule ones, have the capacity to impact the reality of our world as we know it. And for every decision—ours, or someone else’s—a universe exists where the repercussions of the other decision ferment. It’s much more complex, but long story short, there are thousands, millions of universes in the expanse of time and space with you and me populating it. All coexisting simultaneously.”

“That’s a lot.”

“It is. And the universes can be vastly different or nearly identical, but at least one little tweak always exists that differentiates them.” She hesitates, collecting her thoughts. “Anyway, I bring it up only because I was just thinking, you know, things didn’t work out here. But perhaps, in one of those other universes, you and Riley worked out. And you’re happy together.”

Lucas raises his eyebrow, fiddling with a straw wrapper between his fingers. “You think our lives are that tied together?”

“I don’t believe in things like that so much,” she admits. “Soulmates and all that nonsense. But I don’t know, you and Riley seem like the kind of people that were meant to exist in each other’s lives. Maybe forever, maybe only for a period—as in this universe—but I think you’re meant to meet. In whatever capacity that may be. Because, evidently, she taught you something.”

If he’s being honest, she taught him many things. Riley was the person who believed in him when no one else did, that helped him see his own self-worth. She helped his mother find her passion again. She helped him get help when he wouldn’t get it for himself. For all the ways she wounded him in the last few months, she gave him much more in return that he gets to carry with him forever.

It doesn’t hurt to look back on it anymore.

“I know that doesn’t do much or anything,” she says quietly, adjusting her glasses on her nose. “I only thought that perhaps, having that little bit of knowledge, it may provide a weird sense of comfort.”

Somewhere out there, in some universe, he and Riley are okay. Things don’t end suddenly, and things are okay. It just wasn’t this universe.

And he’s okay with that. It took time, but he’s okay, too.

“It does.” He offers her a smile. “Thanks, Isadora.”

She smiles back. When she raises her glass to propose another toast he laughs, obliging and clinking his glass against hers just as Farkle and Zay return to the table.

* * *

Final preparations for moving to California bring Lucas to the local bookstore near the end of the break, carefully poring over his reading list for his first semester of grad school at UC Davis.

It’s amazing, in some ways, how quickly his healing time has accelerated in the last couple weeks. He can walk past Topanga’s without taking a side alley or crossing the intersection to avoid it. He can enjoy a throwback photo from one of his friends without feeling that sting of resentment. What started as a slow return to form has nearly gone back to a complete sense of normalcy, despite how different things are than when he used to dwell more permanently in the city.

Still, certain things still have the power to make his heart jump right back into his throat. And one of those things is a voice that has always sent a little bit of a chill through him.

“Lucas?”

Maya’s voice catches him off-guard, coming from somewhere behind him in the book stacks. He clears his throat, pretending he didn’t hear her and hoping to slink away before having to face this awkward confrontation. Just a few more steps.

But she’s always been craftier than that. And a lot more stubborn.

“Hey, huckleberry! Don’t act like you can’t hear me.”

He pauses, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. When he turns around to face her, he manages a smile that isn’t completely forced. “Maya?”

“Holy shit. It’s been ages”. She looks him over—more so with the usual judgment rather than any sort of interest, but the smile on her face is surprisingly genuine. “And yet, you look exactly the same. Just as dorky as ever.”

“Nice to see you too,” he sneers, earning a playful squint in reply.

For all that he’s supposedly stayed the same, he definitely thinks she’s changed. Her hair is still cropped short, the artsy jagged look she started rocking since going to college in Los Angeles for art. But with her new leather jacket, bleached tips, and couple of piercings in the lip and nose area, she looks like the city swallowed her whole and spit her back out as a true artist in residence.

That being said, she looks happy. And he isn’t going to knock that.

“Well, nice to exchange digs and everything, but I really—,”

“Oh, really? Are you really just going to ride off into the sunset with your books and your ten gallon hat without so much as a proper conversation?” She raises her eyebrow at him, and he notices the small stud pierced there as well. It makes her obnoxious confidence even more boldly defined than before, somehow. “You really don’t have time for a coffee.”

“Well—,”

“Look, I’ll pay, alright? Which is a real crime, considering you’re going to be a vet or whatever and I’m a starving artist.” She holds up a hand before he can respond, cutting him off. “Kidding. I’m not actually starving, please don’t give me the concerned cow eyes. So? Coffee or what?”

Most of him is screaming to run away as fast as he can, like usual, but the rest of him is too flustered to refuse. “Fine.”

“Such enthusiasm! Come on, let’s check out your academic bullshit.” She wrestles half the stack from his hands. “Is that a cow brain on the cover of that book? That’s disgusting.”

After nearly bulldozing him down the street, Lucas and Maya settle in the window table of the nearest café. Despite their usual reluctance to open up to one another that he’s pretty sure will always exist between them, it’s surprisingly nice to catch up with her one-on-one. Riley had always been the string keeping them together—for the first time, it feels like Maya may actually be a friendship of his that stands on its own two feet.

Naturally, however, she comes up eventually.

“I got to admit, I was pretty surprised when she told me.” Maya takes a sip of her tea. “Like, I knew things were on the rocks or whatever, but you guys were Riley and Lucas. You were going to work it out. Her just deciding to let it die—that was ballsy, especially for her.”

“You speak of the moment with such admiration,” he says pointedly, eyeing her over the lid of his coffee.

She raises her hands in surrender. “Sorry. I’m sure it’s still a little sensitive. But then again, it has been more than half a year.” She examines him curiously. “How are you doing?”

“Fine. Honestly. It was rough for a while there, but you move on. Things keep happening. I couldn’t dwell on it forever.”

“Respect,” she says with a nod. But there’s still curiosity twinkling in her blue eyes.

“Ask it.”

“What?”

“Whatever question it is you’re dying to ask. Or think I can’t handle.” He gives her a challenging look—if they ever had anything that was simply theirs, it would definitely be challenging each other. For better or for worse. “Ask it.”

Considering her tone softens somewhat, he can tell it’s not going to be a question he wants to answer. “I just… you know, considering you’re over it or whatever, is there… like, anything you’re still holding on to? Anything that still hurts?”

“Why do you want to know that?”

She shrugs defensively. “I don’t know. I guess I just wonder like, if that were to happen to me—if Riley were to just suddenly cut me out with no warning and no real explanation, I’d like to be prepared for the hardest parts.”

Lucas’s eye roll is full of annoyance. “She would never do that to you.”

“I used to say the same thing about you.” When they lock eyes again, Lucas can see the hint of fear in her features. As intrusive as the question is for barely-friends, she genuinely wants to know. No ill-intentions present. “So?”

He sighs, leaning back in his chair. He thumbs the lid of his cup, trying to process the situation in a way he hasn’t let himself in a long time. “I guess… I don’t know.”

“I think you do, Sundance. I think you do know.”

He waves her off, before starting again.

“I guess… I mean, sometimes I still get stuck on the why. Like it just… happened. She just dropped me. And she told me over and over again that I didn’t do anything, that it wasn’t anything I did, but when something like that happens you have to wonder. And you get stuck on wondering. And in a lot of ways she treats it like it was something we decided on together, like we made this decision to collectively drop each other. But I wasn’t there. I didn’t make that decision. She just dumped me, and I had to pick up the pieces all on my own.”

He can feel himself getting choked up again, that familiar pain in the back of his throat. One little sting that will never quite go away. For the sake of his reputation—and his street cred where Maya Hart is concerned—he works hard to keep it together.

To her credit, Maya is an attentive listener. She doesn’t look the least bit judgmental or critical, her usual expressions. Based on his tone, she can tell he’s serious. That level of vulnerability doesn’t warrant teasing at any expense.

“So I guess even though I’ve gotten past it, and I’ve got other stuff going on, that’s always going to be there. That confusion. Because I’ll never get an answer. Closure, or anything. And there probably isn’t one anyway.”

Maya nods, obviously thinking it over. “I don’t know if this’ll help. It probably won’t, but I don’t think it was vindictive. You know Riley—she’s not like that. And Lucas, as much as it pains me to admit it no matter how old we get, she really did love you. You were one of her favorite people in the entire world. She loved you.”

He stares at the grain in the wooden table. “Just not enough.”

Silence.

“But despite what you think, I don’t think it was your fault. I think that’s true. It’s a lot like what happened with my dad—I mean, it’s not the same at all, but—you get into blaming yourself because there’s no other explanation. But it’s not your fault. And you’re right, you do get left to pick up the pieces. But from the looks of it,” she says, nudging the stack of textbooks on the table between them. “You’re doing a pretty good job.”

He smiles, shifting his gaze from the tabletop to hers. “Is this the part where I say I’m actually going to miss you?”

“Nah, please,” she says, making a disgusted face. But it shifts into a grin. “Besides, Davis is only so far away from Los Angeles. Who knows, maybe you’ll see more of me than you could ever possibly dream.”

“Terrifying.”

She laughs, shrugging coyly. “Can’t get rid of me that easily.”

To his surprise, he’s glad to hear it.

* * *

After saying goodbye to Maya and grabbing the rest of his materials for the trip, Lucas heads down to the subway for one last ride back to his apartment.

Although the city feels different to him now than it once did, he realizes to some degree that he will miss it, for all the backdrops its played in his life. There have been moments where New York was the most wonderful place in the world, and moments where he wanted to jump on a plane and be absolutely anywhere else. But for a time, it was home, and that’s another piece of history he can’t rewrite.

Things change. He’s anxious and excited to see whatever comes next.

He jumps onto the crowded train and manages to squeeze his way to the middle, grabbing onto the overhead bar before the subway gets moving once again. Normally one to keep his head down in a crowd, he takes a minute to savor the eccentricity and diversity of the people around him. The population of the city that never sleeps, the city he once belonged to.

It’s then that he and Riley lock eyes.

She’s sitting in the seat by the subway door—the same one he was sitting in years ago, a terrified repeat seventh grader getting ready for his first day at a new school. When she was standing where he’s standing, and his life changed forever a second later.

He can’t quite believe his eyes, but on the other hand, of course this is where he’d see her again. Because reality loves to give him reminders.

For a moment, neither of them quite knows what to do. Then, Riley offers him a tentative smile—genuine, despite the circumstances. Full of light, as she always is.

It’s surprisingly easy to return the smile. She looks happy, content, even without him, but he realizes he must look the same way. For everything that collapsed between them, they both survived the downpour. For whatever versions there are of them that are out there together, and happy, this version of them exists where they’re staring at each other across the subway car. No longer what they used to be, but never quite strangers. Radio silence.

Even still, they’re going to be okay, too.

The subway pulls to a stop at his station, and for one moment longer they’re trapped in that moment. Another beat in time where for whatever reason, she preludes the next phase of his life. It’s up to him, however, to keep moving forward and see what’s coming around the bend.

Smile still intact, he holds eye contact with her for one last second. Then he turns and heads out, marching forward through the oncoming change. Regardless of what other universes exist out there, this is the one he has, and he wants to be present for it. No matter who sticks with him, no matter who leaves him behind.

This is his life, and he wants to own it. Whatever comes next.


	6. persist ( decaying future )

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special shoutout to my good pal Emma for the inspiration for this chapter and getting me back on track.

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 6 ] Days**

For Riley, it feels as though the world ends the day Judy passes away.

It doesn’t matter what the public officials are broadcasting as their final doomsday prediction. It doesn’t matter how she felt the day they announced Mission Exodus and her family already declared their survival a losing battle, forcing her to leave them behind. It doesn’t matter that the earth has been crumbling away beneath their feet for years at this point, making the argument that the world does not end in a bang, but rather a slow, torturous fizzle that poisons lungs with noxious air and throttles the foolish creatures who dare to continue fighting to inhabit it.

No, the day things truly start to feel like the end is the day their faithful canine companion succumbs to the toxic environment around her. Because when she dies so much more seems to die with her, nothing more pressing than the sparkle in her boyfriend’s eyes.

Riley cannot imagine what making this journey would be like without Lucas. Even before their decision to trek all the way across the wasteland for a shot of getting onto the airship—a fruitless, insane decision as her mother so delicately put it—he’s been a rock for her in ways she doesn’t think she could ever fully express. Surviving in a dying world is difficult enough, but doing it alone seems absolutely impossible.

Lucas reminds her that there’s still something worth fighting for. He’s hopeful, he claims—hopeful for them—and that positive energy is infectious in a way she desperately needs. The way his eyes sparkle even when the rest of his beautiful face is hidden beneath the cloth, the way she feels about him, the entirety of their future together waiting just out of her reach: that’s a cause worth fighting for. That’s a more than convincing enough reason to keep going.

While the rest of the world settles into inevitable death, Lucas reminds her why she’s alive.

She can see the hope begin to leech out of him the longer they travel, bit by bit draining the color from his face and the light from his eyes and the air from his lungs. It’s a subtle deterioration that she knows she’s experiencing as well, no matter how seamlessly knit their cloths are to filter the air entering their lungs. It was a gamble they knew they were taking the second they decided to brave the march for the chance to start life again somewhere new; the very real possibility that they would never make it far enough to try.

Unsurprisingly, Judy is the first of their trio to fall victim to this harsh reality. It’s also the first instance Riley sees the sparkle leave Lucas’s eyes. The first indication that he may not have enough hope left for the two of them to keep them going.

Despite the added risk, she allows him his wish to bury her properly. She crouches in the shade to conserve her energy and watches sadly as her boyfriend slaves away. He doesn’t take a second to breathe until he’s given their companion a suitable resting place, dropping to his knees in front of the grave when the job is finally done.

She wishes she could talk to him. She wishes she could assure him Judy is better off, or comfort him with the sound of her voice. She knows how soothing his is to her, but it’s far too dangerous to remove the cloths outside of an aeration zone and those are rare enough as it is. As they’ve been for many months now, words are essentially obsolete. Regardless of how many she wishes she could give him, for now she has to remain silent.

Instead, she resorts to the other ways they’ve learned to connect. Her father once taught her that when a blind man loses his sight, he quickly learns to compensate with his other senses and in doing so gains a deeper appreciation for all of the good they do him. She has found that’s equally true with communication, and she and Lucas have perfected every facet of it in their efforts to endure together.

Rising from her feet and forsaking the shade, Riley walks the short stretch of distance between them to join him. She lowers herself into a crouch, squinting slightly as the hot wind kicks up dust from the ground and taking in the humble burial site for their beloved hound.

Lucas reaches up and swiftly wipes beneath his eyes, a majority of his expression hidden beneath the protective cloths. Lines trace their way through the grime on his face where tears have fallen, leaving an imprint of the grief both of them are harboring.

Gently, she touches her hand to his face and wipes the fresh tears away with her thumb. When he shifts his glance to look at her she smiles, and even though he can’t see the way her mouth curls upward beneath the cloth of her own she knows he’ll recognize it in the crinkle of her eyes and the roundness of her cheeks.

She knows, because after a moment she sees the crinkle reflected in his own and some of that natural sparkle return to the green eyes that have gotten her through so much. The familiar green that is trekking through this hell with her, the sparkle that gives her a reason to keep going.

She feels his palm come to rest on her knee, thumb softly rubbing circles into her skin.

Together, they keep going.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 5 ] Days**

When the predictions first started flooding in about how rapidly the earth would deteriorate, no one believed them. Warnings are written off, precautions unheeded, a historically grave error as the world dug itself deeper into environmental disarray. Experts disagree about when exactly was the point of no return, but it comes and it goes and with flagrant disregard the human race seals their own grim fate.

It started with the temperatures. Blazing hot, dry summers ravaged the land, and the brutally cold winters that followed stunted any potential regrowth. With the decline of flora so followed the fauna, leaving nature in rather short supply.

But the machines kept working and the people kept on, persisting in a toxic relationship that soon turned the whole atmosphere lethal to inhale. Haze settled over the cities, protective cloths became the new outdoor fashion statement, but still the people kept on.

Riley can remember the evening the united summit announced the end of the world as they knew it, explaining that the earth was simply no longer inhabitable. She sat with Lucas on their tiny loveseat in their cramped apartment, his arm around her and Judy at their feet as the apocalypse creeped up on them and made itself known from the dry delivery of another jaded public official.

She can distinctly remember the way Lucas’s grip tightened more securely around her shoulder. Subtly, instinctively, the two of them already slipping into the silent form of communication that would soon become a necessity. Holding on for a sense of safety when everything else collapsed around them.

But not all hope was lost, they assured them. No, the human race would live on in the stars, as fourteen brand new public airships were unveiled that were to take them all to space. Airships that offered the promise of a future, brighter and better than the dismal, bitter end waiting for them on the ground.

A jubilant relief in theory. A messier reality in practice.

The first four airships—as state of the art and stunning as they were supposed to be—suffer fates more gruesome than slow poison in the air. The first two never make it off the ground. The third explodes upon lift off. The fourth makes it all the way into the atmosphere with resounding cheers from the world below until it shatters in the sky, leaving Earth’s orbit and scattering mementos of the human race far into the rest of the galaxy.

Hope dims as the chance of survival floats away into the vastness of the universe. Riley holds Lucas close that night, searching for the same safety he found in her and willing it to shield her from the inescapability of their demise. Finding hope in his touch and the limited breath that they share and soaking in the feeling of being alive. So, so alive, for as long as it lasts.

It’s the fifth airship that does the same for the rest of the population. When Airship 5 blasts into space and successfully exits Earth’s orbit with all passengers alive and accounted for, celebration erupts in the streets and hope swells once again. Riley can remember venturing out into the town that evening with Lucas in hand, absorbing the joy and the festivity and the sheer power of humanity’s will to live. All the more loud and proud when shared in company, the world heaving one communal collective sigh of triumph.

Lucas kisses her—in the midst of the crowd and the merriment and the rush of adrenaline—and Riley realizes how unbelievably lucky she is. Humanity gets to survive, and she gets a future with him. An endless supply of days filled with his warmth and his laughter and his green eyes that sparkle with so much vitality she wonders if he could keep them alive all on his own.

The ongoing celebration of life loses its heart when it becomes clear not everyone is going to get to be a part of the new future somewhere beyond. Airships 6 and 7 go to the self-described very important people—world leaders and diplomats and social influencers. Airships 8 and 9 to the affluent, all those who could afford to buy their ticket and those of whomever they most loved.

It’s this departure when Riley says goodbye to her dear friends Farkle and his fiancée Isadora. Born and raised a rich man, he gives up all his material wealth for the chance at a future with her, securing the two of them the pricey seats with every last cent to his name. He leaves their dying world a poor man, but unfathomably wealthy in a completely new way—rich with all the opportunities the future holds for him and his beloved.

Riley finds herself wishing she could give Lucas the same. She wishes she had enough even for just him, so she could send him onward to the future he deserves even if it doesn’t include her.

Although she shares this with him, a frightened whisper in the hush of the hazy night, he refutes it adamantly. Whichever world she’s in, that’s where he wants to be. Even if it’s the one rotting from the inside out.

Airship 10 goes to remaining persons of interest. Airship 11 another buyout. Airship 12 is a raffle, one that both Riley and Lucas enter and hold their breath together until the winners are announced a couple of days before departure.

Their luck runs out. Airship 12 takes off for the new world without them.

As the silence surrounding Airship 13 and 14 grows, time marches on and the world continues to corrode around them. The aeration zones are designated and the protective cloths are necessary everywhere else even in private dwellings and offices, acting as a dismal reminder of the life they’re left to live on the ground. Riley watches with an ache in her chest the day its announced and Lucas dons his dark blue cloth for good, hiding his breathtaking smile and stealing the familiar sound of his voice. Promising to keep these treasured aspects of her life out of her reach, theoretically forever.

It becomes a world devoid of beauty. The ground grows rocky and arid, dried out from the harsh weather and gasping winds. As humanity gives up so does upkeep, abandoned buildings, roadways, and possessions falling into disrepair. So much of the color in the world seems to dull, shifting from a kaleidoscope to red-browns and sandy yellows and endless expanses of grey.

But Lucas’s eyes are still green, and Riley learns to redefine beauty. It takes a while to retrain her brain to view their dying world in a state of reverence rather than disdain, but with Lucas altering his viewpoint with her somehow she manages. Together they find beauty in the smallest of moments, the tiniest of miracles, the darkest of hours.

It’s what’s keeping her going as they continue the march towards their future, appearing that afternoon in the form of an exceptional rain shower. As the clouds roll in overhead, the two of them hold their breaths until the lack of tell-tale ozone warning of a more dangerous lightning storm signals that the downpour is friendly.

Despite their matching fatigue, when Lucas locks eyes with her as the first raindrops hit their faces the twinkle is back in his eyes and she recognizes the small crinkle signaling her favorite smile. She tilts her head back to allow the water to plop onto her face, cooling her hot skin and seemingly soaking right into her soul.

The clouds act as a brief and essential reprieve from the relentless sun. The nearly unheard of clean rain cleanses their grime-caked faces and offers free moisture in a way that definitely constitutes a miracle. Riley resists the urge to remove the face cloth and taste the hydration for herself, but she knows such a burst of weather is deceptively calming. While the atmosphere around them is suddenly less hostile for a spell, the toxins in the air are not.

As if sensing her reckless desire or perhaps feeling it himself, Lucas aims to distract her. She breaks into a grin as she feels his hand take hers, guiding her towards him and spinning her into a dance. Their forward momentum is stronger with the little bit of play thrown into the hard work to keep going, and although her boyfriend has never been a dancer it’s as if both of them are experts at the craft with the level of elation the rain seems to shower over them.

They take a moment to breathe, colliding together and holding onto one another as tightly as possible. Taking a moment to absorb another reminder of why they’re struggling so greatly in the first place, what makes the insufferable effort worth it as they drag their feet across the unforgiving and unwelcoming wasteland.

Lucas closes his eyes, skin refreshingly slick with rain as he presses his forehead to hers. Substituting a kiss with the best they’ve got under the circumstances, a gesture that’s become so commonplace and affectionate Riley almost can’t remember why anyone would choose a kiss instead.

Almost.

She spares a glance to look at him, and it’s as though all the beauty of their dying world is captured right in front of her. Like he’s soaked it all up to protect it until they make it to wherever they’re going next.

Riley could never forget how beautiful the world could be as long as she’s with him.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 4 ] Days**

With the news of the status of Airship 13 comes chaos, and hand-in-hand with chaos comes an insatiable craving for violence.

The eve that the last public officials announce that Airship 14 has fallen into disrepair and Airship 13 is unexpectedly the only remaining escape from certain death, it’s as if the whole world simultaneously snaps. The streets that were once filled with celebration are suddenly riddled with riots, looters purging the city and violent crime skyrocketing as desperate survivalists aim to eliminate their competition.

After hiding away for days Riley and Lucas make the uneasy trip to find her family across town, determined to persuade them into the dangerous journey through the arid continent to board the final airship. She assumes it’ll be a non-issue, as both her parents have never been quitters and how could they not fight for their chance at the future when there’s so much life left to live?

It’s a cold shock when Topanga refuses the notion from her only daughter, claiming that the journey is impossible and frankly an insulting waste of time. Why waste their remaining days and energy on a fruitless endeavor when they could huddle close, enjoying the few moments they have left together as a family? What is the point in fighting if the end is already decided for you?

Riley can’t believe her ears, and the wound deepens when her father doesn’t disagree. Her well-meaning, endlessly hopeful father, who believes in the good of humanity almost as much as he believes in them. He and her brilliant mother have already relinquished hope, and they’re expecting her to give in and settle down with them.

She almost does, until she notices the resolute fire in Lucas’s eyes that has replaced the usual sparkle and remembers all that she has waiting for her in the future. If he’s so willing to risk everything to pursue that future with her, she knows she could never lay down and give up the fight. If he’s going to keep going than so is she, the two of them fighting violently and vehemently with everything they’ve got.

Although she anticipated it, Riley could never be fully prepared for how violent their quest would require them to be. She learns it fast enough when they attempt to meet up with her best friend Maya and discover her town in the midst of a riot, only finding her amid the commotion when it’s far too late. With her dying breath Maya hands over her pistol and supplies, making them promise to get to the airship and keep living. Living for her, and everyone else who cannot.

Then, she rips off her protective cloth—blood red even before the violence—and inhales a sharp, starved breath. The gleeful, reckless intake of poison of someone who has nothing left to lose.

It’s Maya’s pistol she’s cradling in her hands as Lucas faces off with their current assailant, one of the musty thieves scouring the wasteland for travelers just as lost and desperate as the two of them. No desire of their own to see that bright new future, so they profit off of the misery and destruction of everyone else while the iron is still hot.

It’s not the first one they’ve faced or the first violent move they’ve had to make, but with the clock running out and energy waning fast Riley can’t bear to watch Lucas take such a beating in an effort to defend her. The weapon she swore she would never use is in her hands and before she knows it she’s firing a bullet. Then another.

Two swift and purposeful shots into the scavenger who threatened to steal the most important thing she has left. The thing she can’t afford to lose.

Lucas steps back numbly as the bruiser collapses with a pained grunt, dropping onto his side and writhing in pain. In a moment Lucas looks over his shoulder and finds Riley, hands still raised and gun still pointed in their direction like she’s frozen in time.

His eyes lock with hers and although there’s a definite amount of surprise breaking through the apathy to the reality of their world, it’s the third emotion shining through his gaze that allows her to thaw. His understanding gives her the freedom to move again, his expression telling her every reassurance she knows he’d speak aloud if he could.

Lucas turns back to face the dying scavenger as Riley makes her way towards him, examining their new problem at hand. Wherever she hit she must not have aimed well, because while the bruiser is in an obvious amount of pain he doesn’t seem to be dying as quickly as she hoped. If she had to take him out, she wanted it to be fast. As painless as possible. Not tragically torturous like their decaying earth, as it seems to have shaken out.

Riley comes to Lucas’s side, brushing her arm against his as both of them stare down at the suffering man at their feet. She gently touches a trembling hand to his wrist, surprised to realize how cold her fingers have grown in comparison to his natural warmth. All of hers drained away the moment she pulled the trigger.

Lucas tilts his head to glance at her again, ignoring the choked complaints of their victim while he takes a long, thoughtful look at her. She isn’t sure what she wants him to do. She doesn’t know if there’s anything he could do.

Somehow, he figures it out without her help. In a subtle motion Lucas removes the gun from her grasp, light as a feather as he takes it into his own. Her hands suddenly free, Riley finds herself reaching for his waist in an attempt to steady herself as the actuality of what she’s done washes over her.

He allows her to huddle close and hug his torso as he turns his attention back to the scavenger. The man is almost no longer human, more resembling a frantic, wounded animal suffering because of her hasty decision. More sickening is the feeling that although she knows it was reprehensible, considering the alternative she can’t bring herself to regret it.

Despite what she realizes Lucas is about to do, his eyes are still shining with their usual amount of humanity. Glimmering with empathy, index finger ghosting over the trigger out of an inclination towards mercy than any sort of violent craving.

Riley tucks her head against his shoulder as he stretches his arm, aiming for a target that is guaranteed to finish the job. She has to look away.

She screws her eyes shut tight as Lucas pulls the trigger, the pained chokes ceasing instantly as the bang from Maya’s final gift to them echoes through the arid desert.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 3 ] Days**

Perhaps to kill a scavenger is to become one, because Riley and Lucas take quick advantage of the motorbike their assailant left behind. Such invaluable transit—working transit, at that—is practically unheard of these days. It gives them an indisputable edge on making it to their destination on time, miles that would take hours by foot cruising by in minutes with the speed of the vehicle.

She holds on tight to Lucas as the world passes them by in a dizzying blur, even more gloomy as the browns and greys blend together into an endless expanse of decay.

The vacant aeration zone they’re able to discover the next night serves as another round of luck, leaving Riley wondering if maybe theirs hasn’t run out just yet. If they continue on the path they’re on, nerves steeled and chests filled with hope, then she can’t see how they couldn’t make it out of this world together. The future is waiting for them with open arms.

Lucas steps into the bunker, flashlight beam splashing across the walls as he searches for the aeration indicator. Riley busies herself searching for the nearest light source, aiming for something a little more helpful than a solitary beam of light. She can’t wait around for his declaration as to whether the chamber is still secure, too filled with anxiety and the unbearable desire to remove the wretched cloth from her face and inhale a breath unobstructed.

It’s as she’s lighting one of the lanterns to brighten the room that Lucas returns to her from the shadows at the other end, nearly stumbling as he reaches her. It takes her another second to recognize he’s lowered his cloth, the realization only hitting her because of the smile she sees spread across his face. How absolutely wonderful it is to see it again.

“Okay,” he murmurs.

The combination of his lovely long-hidden grin and the angelic sound of his voice fills Riley with so much joy she doesn’t know what to do with herself. Even raspy with disuse, his voice will always be the most beautiful melody she ever hears.

Within moments she’s mirroring his beam with one of her own, ripping off her cloth and barreling him with a hug. He catches her and the two of them sway together in the dingy, dimly lit shelter, breathing freely for the first time in days and inhaling the overwhelming sensation of being together. Having made it this far. Believing they’ll make it all the way to the end.

Once they get settled for the evening Riley sets to rationing out some dinner while Lucas silently pours over their scraps of map at the small table. Meager as their options are, starvation has the startling effect of making even the most humble of meals taste delicious. She feels as though she can’t eat hers fast enough even though she makes a pointed effort to take her time with each bite.

It’s a bit worrisome to notice Lucas isn’t nearly as ravenous. Not because he isn’t hungry—there’s no way he couldn’t be—but more so because it seems his appetite has simply vanished. It’s hollowing out just like the rest of him, growing weaker with every day that passes as they attempt to thrive on a planet actively seeking to suffocate them.

She lifts her head from her own empty rations to find him in a strangely blank state, gazing down at the maps on the floor in front of him but not really seeing them. Something about his expression is far away, distant, leaving the rest of him shallow and empty as a result. The sparkle in his eyes is gone, haunted by whatever it is he’s revisiting that she can’t see.

Once again, she wishes she could talk to him. How she misses their talks, their magical ability to have conversations both meaningless and meaningful at the same time. How there was no problem the two of them couldn’t fix with their words and a shared moment, how even just phrases as simple as a few words could lighten her mood and lift her spirits. How she would’ve talked more, had she known just how fleeting such a freedom would be.

Even in an aeration zone, cycling more oxygen in and out of your lungs than necessary is a dangerous game. They’re safer if they’re silent, yet Riley can’t get over how she hates the lost look on his face. How she knows a few words could wipe it away.

Tentatively, she reaches out and touches his forearm in an effort to get his attention. When he lifts his gaze to meet hers, shaking out of his daze, she smiles lightly.

She nods down at his half-eaten rations. “More.”

His eyes widen as the word fills the silence between them. He taps his finger against his closed lips, giving her a warning look before turning his attention down to the food. Although she knows it’s only out of concern for her well-being, a small part of her stings at the dismissal of her speech. She resents the fact that a phrase exchanged between them can no longer be a source of comfort but only a cause for worry, yet another treasured entity that the world has stolen without mercy.

Even still, that resentment isn’t directed towards him. His intentions are good, protective and well-meaning and born out of love. Only communicated in a different, less direct way considering they certainly can’t spare a word to say it anymore.

Riley climbs to her feet, maneuvering around table to stand behind him and wrapping her arms around his shoulders. She leans down and presses a kiss into his hair, reveling in how nice it feels to be able to do so. Basking in the temporary freedom granted to them by their luck that hasn’t yet run out.

He tenses beneath her for half a second before she feels him relax, exhaling a sigh through his nose and welcoming the affectionate gesture. As if remembering the new liberties for himself, he reaches to take one of her hands in his own and presses a kiss into her palm.

This is what they’re fighting for. These freedoms, a future full of shared dinners and generous kisses and the ability to say however much or little they please. It’s worth a trek through hellish terrain and a few more days of unwanted silence and a gunshot in defense of the person she loves most.

If the choice is between anything and keeping him alive, then she chooses him. Every time, without question. She always has, and she always will.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 2 ] Days**

With two days until the final airship disembarks, it seems as though the universe is no longer looking out for them.

The terrain gets harsher. Their pilfered motorbike runs out of steam. The wind gets sharper. Even with their protective gear intact more unpleasant debris seems to find its way into their lungs when it’s not scratching at their skin or tearing at their garb. As the toxins intensify the cloth becomes less and less effective, both of them forming scratchy throats and hacking coughs the further they venture towards the ship site.

There are less and less rations to split between the two of them and nowhere to replenish them. There are more unfriendly faces the closer they get to the docking bay where they’re far from the only two fighting for their chance to survive, and Maya’s pistol quickly runs low on bullets. Dehydration takes a grander toll the drier the air becomes, dizzying their senses and pounding their skulls with headaches.

As far as they’ve come, Riley is starting to believe maybe her mother was right. Maybe the entire journey was futile after all.

It’s the thought she’s nursing as exhaustion takes over her body, weakening her knees and sending her sprawling into the dirt in the middle of the vast desert. No places to crash within sight, no other travelers nearby to offer aid the moment she actually wants to see another soul in pursuit of their same goal.

As her back hits the gravel pain erupts along each one of her muscles, burning all the more intensely with how parched her body is for water. The sky above her is just as dismal as the rest of their dying earth, hazy orange with the white hot sun bearing down on them relentlessly.

Lucas appears over her a second later, wonderful green eyes alight with concern. He drops down next to her, helping her sit up and assessing her for greater injury.

“I can’t,” Riley whimpers, tears sprouting in the corner of her eyes. The words are muffled through the cloth. She doesn’t see how she has any tears to give when she is so fundamentally dried up from the inside out. “I can’t.”

Lucas shakes his head, refusing to accept her surrender. She doesn’t know how he’s still going when her mind feels so heavy with emptiness—he’s every bit as exhausted and malnourished and heat stricken as she is and yet he won’t give up. Somewhere buried deep inside him, there’s still hope left for the two of them.

Apparently, he won’t let her give up either. She feels his arms wrap around her and before she realizes what’s happening she’s rising from the ground, Lucas scooping her up and rising back to his feet.

Panic rises in the back of her throat. He’s already fatigued enough, he couldn’t possibly carry her. She can’t let him. She can’t let him sacrifice his survival for the sake of her own.

“No,” she argues, but it’s hard to make out through the cloth and she can tell he’s not listening to her anyway. His green eyes are determined as he looks past her in the direction they’ve been marching all this time, obviously intent on moving forward together even if he has to shoulder both of their weight.

The tears transform into sobs, miraculously wet yet painfully dry all at once. A delirious sort of hysterics. Another effortless tactic from the universe to drain everything out of her.

“No, Lucas,” she cries, aware of how the throbbing in her head is increasing due to the tears and how she can hardly keep her eyes open. The world is beginning to swim around her, vision blurring and blacking at the edges as her consciousness begins to creep away from her. “Lucas…”

The last thing she registers is his arms secure around her and the resolute glare dominating his expression before the world tunnels in around her, darkening the decomposing landscape into infinite black.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 1 ] Days**

Riley dreams about the future.

Or maybe, a different universe entirely. The world is no longer on fire, but the mood is warm. She and Lucas are together, peacefully so, and all her friends are within arm’s reach. Each day passes by with a sense of ease, guaranteed, and there is hardly any stressing about the future because the future is theirs to own.

It’s a shock to come back to reality and remember the universe in which she currently exists. The one where the world is indeed on fire, and as far as she can remember was just about to swallow them whole.

She’s in an aeration zone, miraculously unoccupied save for the two of them. She’s on the provided cot and Lucas is collapsed beside her, so drained of color and so still for a terrifying moment she believes he’s gone. It isn’t until she presses her shaky hands hard into his chest and his heartbeat thrums under her touch that she allows herself to breathe, awash in the relief that he’s still with her.

That somehow they’re still together, and somehow, they’re still alive.

A little poking around reveals that the aeration indicator doesn’t seem to be reading correctly, and further investigation shows that Lucas already figured this out. The note left in his untidy scrawl for her explains as much, noting that they should not remove their cloths, for better safe than sorry. He seems to have jotted it down in a hurry before he knocked out beside her, simply in case this very scenario arose in which she would come around before him. Considering he seemingly carried her through the desert, she can understand how he would still be out cold.

His letter also informs her that they’re just outside the ship site and they should rest as much as they can here before the departure tomorrow. It’s going to be hectic, and if they want their fighting chance they’re going to need to be as prepared as possible.

She casts a glance at him crumpled on the cot, suddenly consumed with an odd blend of adoration and anguish. Overwhelming adoration for this brave, unyielding man who she loves so ardently, but accented with anguish over how far he pushes himself. How painstakingly and relentlessly he works to keep the two of them going, to keep her alive.

For the night, she decides, it’s her turn to return the favor. To take care of him the same way he does for her as she always hopes she does, especially if it may very well be their last night.

Riley sets to securing their little base for the evening, working out a way to jam the door from the inside so that no other wandering, desperate duos gunning for a shot at the future tomorrow will stumble into the sanctuary they broke their backs to earn. She scavenges the bunker to see what may have been left behind, rejoicing at the spare rations and few bottles of water she finds tucked away.

When Lucas finally rouses awake she’s at his side, helping him to drink some of the water. They move carefully to avoid too much exposure in jostling their cloths, but Riley finds herself wondering what the point of it really is anyway. Whether they’re going to get on that ship tomorrow or not, she doesn’t see what one last night with the freedom to breathe as they please is going to change.

She doesn’t fight the issue until they’ve finished gathering their materials for the morning, well aware of the grueling reality they’re likely to face. It’s then, as she’s grappling with the dangerous journey they’re about to finish for better or for worse and observing her boyfriend who risked everything he had left to get her this far safely, that she lowers her cloth.

“Lucas,” she murmurs, unprepared for how scratchy her voice comes out. She had almost forgotten how corrosive the air outside had become.

He whips around to face her the moment she speaks. His eyes are widen again with that same visceral instinct to protect her, even from herself. He points to his own protective cloth, raising his eyebrows pointedly at her. Insisting she put hers back on before she does any more damage than both of them have already endured.

Plaintively, she shakes her head.

The surprise that takes command of his features is almost a compelling enough motivator to hide back behind her cloth again, but not as strong as the reasons she removed it in the first place. She wanders over to stand in front of him, hands finding his as she gazes up at him.

Finally bold enough to decide she can say whatever she wants, only now that it’s so she discovers she’s out of words. Having trained so long to communicate without them, it’s as if they’ve left her for good.

“No more fear,” she mutters, locking eyes with him and attempting to assuage his obvious worry. The dread they’ve lived in for so much of their lives that in a few hours will no longer matter, regardless of the outcome of their quest. Hoping to channel some of her own certainty to him so that he can share in this sense of finality with her, so they can share these last moments in the world as they know it without anything holding them back.

All she knows for sure is that she loves him. She loves him, and for another fleeting moment she doesn’t want anything else to matter.

Gently, she reaches up and pulls the dark blue cloth from his face, letting it bundle at his collar instead. Where she wishes it could be all the time, so that she could admire him properly whenever she pleases. Particularly in moments like this one, when his expression is thoughtful and soft. When his concentration is reserved solely for her, devotion shining through the sparkle in his those beautiful green eyes.

She touches his cheek, brushing her thumb against his lower lip before meeting his eyes. Not certain how to articulate what she wants from him without so many words, but somehow finding the phrase and hoping as skilled as they are at following one another that he’ll understand.

“Be with me.”

After a moment of hesitation, Riley leans forward and presses a soft kiss to his lips. A somewhat foreign gesture considering all the time it’s been. His lips are harsher than before, cracked from dehydration and sharp winds. Their posture is stiffer than before, worn from exhaustion and months of avoidance of this particular interaction. But the sensation is enough to render all of it irrelevant, the embrace just as grounding and all-consuming as she remembers it.

When they break for breath Lucas nudges his forehead against hers, almost as if its habit when they’re sharing the intimacy they are in that moment.

Despite how ragged it’s been worn, she doesn’t think she will ever tire of the sound of his voice. “Always.”

The next kiss is his, and already the hesitancy is evaporating to give way to their warm familiarity and undeniable connection. Allowing them to come out of hiding in a way they truly only can with one another, forgoing all the layers of protective gear and precaution and energy spent towards fighting to survive and allowing it to be directed towards something far more fulfilling. Something soft and compassionate in a world that long since abandoned both.

Regardless of what happens in the morning, Riley can hold onto the fact that they made it this far. They got to where they are now without ever giving up, without ever forgetting how much they can accomplish and how far they can go together. Although the fight persists for the chance at having their future, she realizes maybe the present isn’t so bad.

 _Riley._ It’s simply her name that Lucas chooses to risk a breath to whisper in between kisses to her skin, as if that alone encompasses everything else he could possibly say. As if that alone is the only thing that could possibly matter in a world where any breath could easily be your last.

And so she is.

* * *

**Airship 13 Departure in [ 0 ] Days**

The hour before the airship door closes and takes the last survivors from Earth up into space and into the future, the launch site is a full blown revolution scene.

Riley had anticipated there would be a crowd, but the amount of people frantically attempting to reach the airship before departure far exceeds the scope that her brain had previously envisioned. The instant they step into the crowd they’re jostled around and she nearly loses Lucas, trapped for a horrifying moment in a riptide full of rioters all willing to do whatever it takes to secure their own life.

She feels a hand grip her wrist and yank her from the sea of strangers, dizzy with relief when she collapses into Lucas as he pulls her back to him. They exchange intense eye contact for the briefest of moments, mentally catching up with the situation and making sure they’re on the same page.

Then, Riley locks their fingers together painfully tight as they begin to push their way through the crowd.

It’s a series of obstacles as they progress too slowly towards Airship 13, gaining a number of bumps and bruises as the mob grows rowdy with unrest. More distracting than the pandemonium is how consumed with fear Riley is that she’s going to lose him, that one moment he’ll be in her grasp and the next he’ll be lost to the chaos without so much as a goodbye. She can’t fathom having gotten this far with him by her side only to lose him.

Much like he once told her, she can’t fathom a world worth living in if he’s not there.

They end up having to scale one of the base exterior gates, Riley arriving at the upper level first and whipping around to help him up after her. The moment they’re both back on their feet they drift together and rejoin hands, well aware that managing to have stayed together this long far exceeds any luck they may have and they’re only going to continue to push it.

The crowd on the docking level is less tightly packed but more unpredictable, boasting the truly desperate cases willing to literally claw their way to the final escape from their deteriorating home even if it kills them. For every living body still rushing towards the airship there’s a corpse littering the ground at their feet, threatening to trip Riley up with every step they take.

Finally, finally, she can see Airship 13 towering ahead of them. She feels a fevered grin spread across her face and whips around to inform Lucas only to get rammed into from behind. She feels her grip on Lucas slide away as she sprawls onto the concrete, her lunatic attacker bearing down on her and immediately beginning to grab for her belongings. She attempts to fight back but the man smacks her across the face, her cheek erupting in tingles as she falls back against the pavement again.

She feels blood splatter her face a second after a bang erupts through the commotion. She scrambles backwards as the desperate man collapses in front of her, becoming another corpse scattered along the path to salvation.

From the spot where she was separated from him, Lucas lowers Maya’s gun. His expression is hard to read hidden behind the dark blue cloth, but something about his eyes reminds her of how difficult these last few years have been. How far away he could go in his own head in the worst of times.

He jogs over to her and helps her to her feet, having tossed the gun in the other direction as frantic rioters charged him for it moments after his kill shot. He pulls her to him, pressing his head against hers so he can attempt to communicate a word into her ear.

“Last one,” she thinks he says through the cloth, explaining the haphazard abandonment of their only weapon. She gives him a look and nods, weaving their fingers together again and looking towards the airship looming above them. Their entire future, so close she can practically taste it. Guaranteed to be worth it after everything they’ve been through.

As they’re jogging their way towards the ship, Riley can’t help but notice how the crowd begins to thin. It’s a confusing prospect considering the reason they’re all there anyway, but she can’t spare a second to dwell on it. She only breaks her concentration for another terrifying moment when she feels their progress halted, Lucas being yanked away from her and pulling her backwards in the process.

She whips around to find Lucas being accosted by another frantic civilian, this one a wide-eyed woman who is evidently not all there. She’s shouting something at him, something she can’t make out, and it takes all of her courage to remember how to make her limbs work and tug him back in her direction. The woman lets him go without a fight, but it’s evident that he understood whatever crazy sentiment she was hollering at him.

Riley searches him, trying to read the situation and comprehend whatever he just heard that took the sparkle out of his eyes. What could possibly cause such a thing when they’re so, so close. She squeezes his hand.

Her reiterated touch brings him back down to earth. He locks eyes with her for a long moment, when miraculously she watches the glimmer return to them. As if he’s realized something else, and suddenly all of his hope is back again.

Lucas doesn’t offer an explanation. He nods her in the direction of the airship, urging her to finish what they started.

The two of them make their way up the ramp towards the ship, Riley’s heart catching in her throat when she sees the already full ship just beginning to shut its doors. She pulls Lucas along behind her as hard as she can and sprints towards it, so close now that she absolutely refuses to miss their chance. The future is there in her grasp, just within her reach, and she’ll be damned if she doesn’t make it.

She risks the hazard of pulling her cloth out of her face, screaming at the top of her lungs as they cross the threshold of the docking bay and come within feet of the airship doors. “Wait!”

Her arm reaches out to grab the door, able to launch herself through them and into the ship without issue. None of the public officials give her any trouble either, allowing her to slide into the transport and secure herself a survivor’s seat. She exhales a harsh sigh, momentary relief flooding through her as she absorbs the stark reality that she made it.

It isn’t until she’s safely behind the doors that her adrenaline subsides and she realizes that she’s no longer holding Lucas’s hand.

But she didn’t let go of him. She never would.

The doors close just as she’s wheeling around, cold nausea washing over her as she sees Lucas standing just outside airship. Watching her go, not putting up a fight.

“Lucas!” she shouts, suddenly hysterical. She runs back towards the doors and attempts to pull them open again, but they won’t budge. She bangs against the glass, feeling tears fill her eyes once again as her boyfriend looks back at her from the other side. “Lucas!”

He locks eyes with her through the glass, appearing far too calm in comparison to how manic she’s feeling. He reaches up to the pull the dark blue cloth from his mouth, a simple gesture of acceptance that’s obviously hard to manage without the precautious, practiced pause they’ve exercised for so long.

Although it’s hard to hear him, being able to see his lips move helps her decode the words he says to her. “Last one.”

In painful bursts, pieces of the puzzle start to fit together in her mind. The fact that the public officials didn’t stop her from boarding, as there was likely only one spot left and they needed to fill it. That the reason the crowd was so thin was because this reality had already been broadcast, and those frantic monsters attacking them on the upper levels were not desperate survivors but those who had already given up. That the reality of there only being one spot was likely what that frenzied woman shouted at Lucas in the moment she was too far away to hear, enlightening him to this important fact that she never even considered.

When she lost her grip on him when she made it into the ship, it wasn’t because they were forced apart. It was because he let her go.

The engine of the airship begins to rev beneath her, causing her panic to shift into agony. She locks eyes with him again, tears slipping down her cheeks as she tries to soak up as much of those striking green eyes as she can before they’re stolen from her forever.

“Keep going.”

It’s the last thing he mouths before he darts away from the docking bay, escaping the trajectory of the blast range as they take off. Riley bursts into sobs, unable to tear her eyes away as she’s carried up, up high into the sky, headed towards the future. Leaving him and the rotting, desolate planet behind her for the promise of something better.

But she can’t see how that could be when he won’t be there with her.

Unbelievably, Lucas offers her a smile as she drifts away from him. It’s the last glimpse of him she gets. Genuine, wonderful, more beautiful than any nature that may have existed before it all decayed away.

Then he removes his protective cloth entirely, wringing it in his hands as he watches her disappear into the vast expanse of the universe above him.

Finally free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, hello all! It's really been almost 8 months since I updated this fic... actual blasphemy if I do say so myself. Apologies for leaving you on such a bittersweet note for so long and then returning with an even more depressing update. It is, how they say, the cookie crumbles. But I promise my next update will be happier in tone, cross my heart!
> 
> Thanks for reading and happy July!


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